The Voice in the Dream
by OneDarkandStormyNight
Summary: Merlin, calling himself Colin James in this lifetime, has been lost, alone, and searching for purpose since the death of Arthur a thousand years ago. When Mordred and Morgana suddenly appear, reborn, his loneliness and despair draw him to the bargain they offer: the end of his immortality for Excalibur. Little does he know, Arthur Gregory is a young London heir with strange dreams.
1. Part i

_HO. LEY. CHEESE.  
170 pages. Yes, that's how long this fic is, all seven parts combined. That's about 87,000 words. I did warn you that you'd have plenty to read from me, didn't I? Well, here's Part 1—the first part of the reason why I've been slightly AWOL the past few weeks. I almost regard each part as a sort of "movie," like in the style of Lord of the Rings; each "Part" is a long story which leads to a second "Part," and so on. (There are six parts, by the way, and an epilogue.)  
As the summary states, this is a reincarnation!story, but just so we're clear—Merlin himself is the only character you'll recognize who is NOT reincarnated, but in fact he's been alive for 1,533 years, precisely. It's a partly-adventure/fantasy, mostly-angst/friendship story, so I hope you'll enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I'm a little nervous that you won't read it all because it's so long, but I hopehopehope you'll stick around until the end! You're all so great to do so in all my one-shots and shorter multi-chapters, and I want to thank you so much for that with this summertime gift!  
I'm trying not to put too much Author's Note, but one thing I'd like to say is that this is sort of a pre-published work to me, which means that as of now I'm actually working on an original book I'd like to get published soon for real! It's a very different genre style, but I'd love constructive criticism on dialogue, grammar, plot, flow, etc., if you please!  
REMEMBER! To anyone reading this, this fic was written under the knowledge of Season 4 events; I knew nothing about Season 5 or later seasons when I wrote all parts of it, so there are guaranteed to be things that do not match up with the show post-Season 4. I wrote it with inspiration from both the show AND the legends, especially regarding the Final Battle scenes. Any similarities or conflicts in the plots after Season 4 settings are completely coincidental. Thanks so much and I hope you enjoy!_

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream**

**Part i**

_"Arthur! Behind you!"_

_He whirled around with quickness and agility that could come only from a lifetime of training and preparation—preparation for this battle, this moment, even if he had never known it until now._

_His eyes were struck with the gleam of the dull sunlight reflecting from the metal of a blade, and even while he realized with a terrible jolt that he couldn't move fast enough, that he wasn't as young as he once had been, that _this_ blade might surely be his last rival, he could not help but wonder at how incredible it was that the sun's rays were still shining and penetrating the putrid atmosphere of war surrounding them._

_The sound of swords clashing all around seemed to vanish altogether as the unknown opponent grew closer and closer, his blade raised high above his head…_

…_and then, the dark figure was gone, blown back like a weightless leaf in a wild wind._

_A hand, wrinkled and weathered, stretched out in the edge of his vision; eyes, golden and glowing, met his own._

_Scarcely a beat between them, but it was enough to convey all, and then that same voice, coarse with age but still so alive, in a language that was not the one he knew, but something more ancient and primitive,_

_"The tower, Arthur. She's in the tower."_

_He followed the eyes, aqua blue now, to the great fortification standing on the hill before them, like a wicked giant watching with solemn exultance the brutal conflict between the two armies, untouched by all but the darkness sweeping in with the opaque storm clouds gathering overhead._

_He turned to his ally, never fully taking his attention from the battle around them for fear of assailant; even in the midst of such outward and inner turmoil, he could somehow find the presence of mind to appreciate that this man, whose hair had been dark and face innocent when all of this had begun so long ago, who had had every chance to leave him to suffer this war alone, was still here, still with him, still ready to endure whatever he must to save him._

_"Go," he heard himself say, in a voice as worn and rough as his companion's, and it was a voice he would not have recognized when he was a younger man, before he had been aged by the cruel world around him._

_His friend's eyes, deep as an endless pool, darkened with doubt and dread, and for only one, brief moment, he took in that look, the one which bespoke of such incredible loyalty and undeserved love, before the unmistakable death-cry of one of his youngest men rang in his ears from somewhere in the fray._

_His companion did not move, only waited for him to give the word, ever as calm and trusting as he had always been, standing so still and silent with the fraught movements of the battle so close behind him._

_He sucked in a harsh breath, and took firm grasp of his courage, for though they both had known it would come to this, he had never been one for goodbyes._

_Then, his own harsh shout, resolute and succumbing, echoed more painfully in his head than the roar of war._

"_Go, Merlin!"_

_Merlin did not look back._

* * *

Arthur heard his own gasp as he woke with a start, heart pounding in his ears and breathing sharp and painful in his lungs.

He looked around himself, and where he half-expected to see freshly dead bodies attired in some capes of red and some of black, he saw only the obscure shape of his dresser, sitting silently against the plain wall beside the window.

Pale moonlight poured in, illuminating a perfect rectangle across the center of his small bed, shining upon him like a quiet reassurance of reality.

He carded his fingers through his damp, silken hair, and was irritated at their trembling.

"A dream," he murmured to himself, firmly, and it was more to hear his own voice than anything.

Still, he repeated it in his mind several times and let his breathing calm before he stood and moved through the light of the moon to the window. He rested his head against the cool glass and peered down into the street, letting the muffled noises of the few cars below serve to confirm that he was, in fact, standing by the slightly dirty window in his apartment in central London, and not at the open one where he so often dreamed he stood, in a medieval castle tucked away in a vast forest where knights bearing a golden crest scoured and pure-white unicorns grazed and magic danced in the breeze.

And where he sat upon a regal throne with a warlock called Merlin at his side.

* * *

Merlin walked alone in a strange world.

It was not unfamiliar, certainly not that. He had walked this way more times than even he could recall; with its immense, lush oaks and its soft, dirt footpaths, it was as close to the place he knew as home as he dared to get. He knew that, less than a mile from where he walked in silence, the continuous blaring of car horns and the blinding glare of city lights cut through the peace of the air, and that he must return to it eventually; while he was here, however, surrounded by the sweet-smelling plants whose branches swung gently in the breeze, as though friends greeting him as he passed, he could very nearly imagine that he was not there at all, in that huge city which was regarded as one of the brightest and best in all the world but was really nothing but anger and greed and sadness, and that he would travel the worn pathways until he soon reached the gate of the city which truly _had_ been the best.

He thought sometimes of returning to that place, of sitting at that secret brook from which he used to drink when he was in search of herbs for Gaius, and of looking out across that fertile hill where he had once been able to catch the first glimpse of the strong and majestic city called Camelot.

Sometimes, he wished he could forget it. He wished he could erase from his mind the sensation of pure contentment when the first great tower reached his eyes after a long journey away, and the sweet scent of the breads in the marketplace and the soothing sound of hoofs against the cobblestones and the welcoming smiles which met him as he maneuvered with the ease of familiarity through the winding streets toward the solid castle in the center.

He belonged nowhere now, to _no one_, living an empty life in an unhappy land, his hair forever dark and face eternally young so that no one could ever guess how many hundreds of years had passed since his age had matched his countenance. For this lifetime, he hid within the meaningless name of Colin James, because his true identity was just a comical shadow in a legend so ancient that no one even cared for it anymore.

No one cared that there had once been a good and wise physician called Gaius, who had taught the would-be prodigy Merlin how to be equally good and wise, or that Merlin loved him as a father long before the kingdom loved Merlin as its savior. No one cared that there was once a great dragon named Kilgharrah, who suffered captivity in a dank cave for twenty years and who waited with restless spirit for the world of freedom Arthur would raise. No one cared that there were five knights—Percival, Gwaine, Lancelot, Elyan, and Leon—or that they were all good and noble soldiers who fought without self-regard for their beloved king. No one cared that there was a beautiful woman with dark skin and a kind heart named Guinevere, or that Arthur was the only person who never called her "Gwen," and that she spoke with honesty and honor, and that was how she cared for Arthur's heart as well.

Merlin thought Arthur might find it amusing, the fictional rumors which fueled book plots and movie scripts in this modern age.

He supposed he should be grateful that at least Arthur's name was not forgotten. As hollow as he was, he himself could not resist a smirk of enjoyment as he listened to schoolboys argue over which of them got to be King Arthur in the battle (for the first few hundred years, it was with wooden swords and armor of gray sackcloth, now of computer-animated figures and glowing weapons which looked nothing like the true Excalibur). When a historian once had declared that even as a prince, Arthur was the cleverest, brightest, and quickest of all the boys in the kingdom, Merlin had commented, in so many words, that _perhaps you should have seen him yourself before you assume he was anything more than a royal prat with an arrogance issue._

That had been in the year 1681, and he'd never attended another history class again.

Now, he nearly looked up when a figure with broad shoulders and blonde hair which gleamed in the electric lights passed him, but he did not, for he had learnt long ago that no matter how many of them looked like kings, they would never be Arthur. They would never possess his wit, or his heart, or his soul; he was impossible to duplicate.

So through the circling days and years and centuries, Merlin chose to walk alone.

* * *

As had become his daily problem, Arthur did not see the buildings and vehicles and people as the train sped through the city. Instead, _his_ face flashed through his mind…his, and so many others'…and he rubbed his eyes in hopes to dispel the visions.

Though, he knew, he didn't really want them to disappear. As insane as he sounded even to himself, and though he should _grow up_ and _stop dreaming make-believe_, he could never stop them, could never _want_ to stop them. There was something in them, in these dreams which felt so real and yet so unreal. He was _complete_ in his dreams, like he was a half of something greater and that when he dreamt, the other half was with him, and that was something he could never explain to even himself.

"Are you all right, Arthur?"

He looked to his right, where Kate was watching him with green eyes that held that all-too-familiar look of odd regard.

"Yes," came his standard answer. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Dreaming about your beloved kingdom again, are you? Say hi to Guinevere for me?"

Arthur sighed and wished for the umpteenth time that he hadn't let his father's young, accomplished secretary hang out at his place that one time he got drunk.

"I told you," he said, hoping that she didn't notice the blush creeping upon his cheeks, "they're just dreams, Kate. They don't mean anything."

She flipped her mock blonde hair from her face and watched him shift uncomfortably in his seat, and just as she knew he would, he misunderstood the weight of her gaze entirely.

"I'm serious, Kate," he reaffirmed, and there was no mistaking the blush now. "There is nothing to these dreams except a little too much imagination from my childhood."

"Imagination?" she laughed. "You? Arthur, you have about as much imagination as a doorpost. Perhaps it's just plain insanity."

"_Kate_."

She smiled coyly but did not interrupt as he continued.

"We've been friends for what—seven years now?" He pulled unconsciously at his sleeve in the chilly air. "And in all that time, have I ever shown any signs of insanity…besides these dreams?"

"I suppose not, Arthur."

He narrowed his sapphire eyes at her without amusement.

"No," he corrected firmly. "The answer is no, Kate. I don't actually believe that in some alternate universe, I am, or once was, King Arthur. For all I know, he may never have existed at all. Camelot may be nothing more than a myth. They've never found proof of it, you know."

"That doesn't mean it never existed," she reminded him without hesitation. "And all historians will tell you that Arthur must have lived at some point."

"I know that, Kate," he sighed, but before he could say more, she added,

"And what about Merlin?"

If she noted the way his back seemed to tense just the slightest bit at mention of the name, Kate never said so, but only continued to watch him with intense eyes, aqua in color and swirling with something he had never noticed since the day he accidentally ran into her in the park and they met for the first time in their lives.

"What about him?"

"If Arthur lived, then Merlin must have as well."

"And what makes you say that?"

Her eyes dimmed, but as always, Arthur never saw the memories dancing around in the darkest parts of her mind, or understood what it meant when her teeth clenched together.

"Well, if Arthur was anything like you," she said at last, and it was supposed to be teasing, but her voice had changed just the littlest bit, "then he would have needed someone smarter than him to guide him."

"So you're telling me," Arthur's loud and skeptical voice pulled her shifting eyes back to his face, "that you actually believe a magical man called Merlin took a long-lost prince named Arthur to a rock with a magical sword stuck in it, and that this boy was crowned king just because he could pull the sword out in one try. And even though Merlin was already a shriveled-up old man in a pointy hat, he lived long enough to be Arthur's advisor for fiftiesh years, until at last he was locked for eternity in an enchanted tree by the woman he was stalking. The end."

Kate flitted her gaze up to Arthur, and the hard laugh which escaped her did not mean exactly what Arthur assumed.

"No," she conceded lightly. "I guess that is very fictional, isn't it?"

"Total and complete rubbish," he agreed, returning his attention to the scenery outside. "If they both did live, they were probably just like every other king and advisor that have ever been in Britain. They were just chosen by bored writers to be characters because they won some great battles against a few bad people. That's all."

At that, the two friends both turned away in what could have been a congenial silence. Neither saw the other's face as Arthur's fell in a peculiar sort of inward guilt at his own disregard for the legend which haunted his dreams, and Kate's darkened with an unspoken vengeance which seethed beneath the surface like sizzling poison.

Arthur could never have known it, but she did.

She knew it was all to begin a second time.

She was determined that she would not lose again.

* * *

Merlin had no home.

The place at which he dwelt was not his home. It was bleak, and empty, with bare, white walls and water-stained ceilings. In it, the air was always cold, and the sun shone in to light up the monotony only once for a short time in the day before it disappeared from the view of the tiny, warped window.

Once, when he was but a young manservant to a demanding prince, he might have leapt at the chance to live in such freedom as he had in this modern world. Now that his skills were sharpened and his magic potent with ages of use, he could live in better conditions than any king of Camelot ever did; he could invent riches from nothing if he so desired, he knew, and live in total invincibility in whatever glory he wanted.

Now, however, he would give up a thousand lifetimes of glory if he could simply serve Arthur again.

He had nearly nothing from that past life. During the expanse of time of what is called the Middle Ages, his kind were hunted once more, by men—some truly wicked, some only frightened of what they did not understand—more cruel and ruthless than Uther Pendragon ever was during the Great Purge. He had been more inexperienced then, lost and unaided by anyone, and so he had been forced to abandon every scrap of recollection he had, from the tiniest bottle of potion to the worn book Gaius had given him in well-meant hopes that first week in Camelot, before of any of them knew what he was, or was to become. He had the pages memorized, every discolouration and fold of them, but he'd still felt a choking pain in his chest as he had watched it burn into ashes in a great fireplace raging with so many fragments of him.

He had changed his name for the first time that night, and he was never called by it again.

He hardly needed even to think about unlocking the door of his flat. So accustomed was he to using his magic—albeit discreetly, just as it had been before Arthur's setting him free and as it seemed it would always be now—he did not even feel the flash of power any longer. Where it had once been a process of constant learning and study, magic was as easy to him now as breathing; there were no books of enlightenment for him to read, no spells left to practice until perfect. He knew them all, and yet they did him no good except to open a door or flip on a light. There was no evil to vanquish (at least, none that was anymore worth it), no Camelot to defend, _no one to protect_…and so it was all but futile knowledge to him, and while he still loved the magic within him, he despised its uselessness more and more each day.

He entered slowly into the blackness of the flat, eyes flashing gold once and dispelling the darkness with small circles of light floating in every corner and little flames appearing on honeycomb-wax candles placed about the room. He had used electricity for a short while, when it had first appeared in the world and he'd thought it more remarkable than anything ever invented by man, but its novelty had worn off eventually, and he much preferred to step into a place lit dimly with his precious magic and candles bearing one of the elements of the earth than one bathed with the glaring brightness of electric bulbs.

He had taken the time to remove his tan jacket and woolen, red scarf before he felt it trickle into his awareness.

His back stiffened abruptly, the little places at the back of his neck and the base of his spine tingling at the sensation he had not felt in centuries. His eyes became wide and bright, the slightest gold seeping into them—not from himself, from somewhere else, _someone else_….

He looked up, his heart suddenly pounding in his head and fingers curled in instinctive readiness. There was nothing to see in the reflection of the mirror in front of him but his own face, and yet, in the still-dark bedroom behind him, something was tugging at him, pulling insistently at his spirit….

The forgotten scarf dropped to the mock-wood floor, and he turned toward the closed door of the room, body trembling not with fear, as he supposed it should, but with anticipation, for here, after all these endless years, someone was here, someone had _found him_, and perhaps, no matter for what they had come, they could give him purpose, could make his life meaningful again….

His blood had run cold even before he saw the figure standing beside his bookcase in the unlit room.

It was madness, perhaps, and obsessive devotion as well, but when he looked into the peering, iced eyes and his magic whispered in frantic, _Mordred,_ the first coherent thought in his mind was that _if he was here again, perhaps so were others…Arthur…_.

He stepped without trepidation through the doorframe, and five candles about the place flickered to life at his presence, illuminating the pale and stone-cold face before him.

Mordred closed the tome in his hands and replaced it upon the shelf with the others, his crystal-blue eyes never leaving Merlin's as he did so. He was surely not much older than a boy, with the stature and age about his countenance of a man equal to Merlin. Like the ages-old warlock, however, he was not what he seemed.

Merlin had only to look once into his icy eyes to see it.

"_Emrys."_

Mordred's face did not move, but his youthful voice whispered inside Merlin's head all the same, inspiring a thousand questions within him. There was one, however, to which he knew the answer already. Mordred had returned, from some wicked place deep in the earth, to make a request of his own.

"It has been many centuries since I was called by that name," said he unflinchingly, in their native tongue of the old Albion, though he himself was so long in speaking it he wondered, briefly, if he was fluent anymore.

"_I know it has been."_

Mordred stepped forward, softly and eerily, like a spirit come to haunt him from dreams he wished to forget; his steps did not even make the old floor creak as it always did when Merlin walked upon it, so light and delicate were they.

"Then you know," said Merlin, who never moved, even when Mordred was but a few feet from him, "that I'll not help you."

"_You will. You must, Emrys. It is the only way that we can be free again."_

"I refuse to throw my good magic in with your selfish kind. Excalibur is safe, where the likes of you will never find it and use it for evil."

"_Look where your 'good magic' has gotten you, warlock."_

He tried to hide the breaking of his breath at the truth those words struck in him, but he could hide nothing from his brother of the Old Religion, and Mordred slid closer to him across the dull and scratched floor of his lonely room.

"_They told you,"_ his voice carried on, softly, almost in sympathy, though Merlin knew that could never be so, not with the coldness of his soul which could never be cured, _"that it was your destiny. They whispered words in your mind and to your heart, told you that Albion would be saved and magic freed through you and your king, if you would only serve them and their will."_

He refused let the curtains shielding his eyes fall and reveal it all within him to his old enemy, but even as his gaze hardened and his fingers curled against his palms, he remembered in his deepest soul how many, many times these very words had risen in his mind while he sat alone in the dark.

"_Look out your window, Emrys. Albion is not saved. Magic is not free. You gave your life as a servant to the destiny they chose for you, and now that Camelot's time to reign in greatness is over, they have abandoned you, left you cold and forgotten in the world they let die after you sacrificed all to resurrect it."_

Merlin realized suddenly that his eyes had fallen from Mordred's, and that his mask had dropped as he felt the reality seep into his heart and kill him slowly, as it had been doing for ages; with each passing moment in his history since his era of glory, he had been dying in spirit, little by little. To hear the words not from himself, but from the heart of another from that same past, only served to increase their potency. What reasons he once had to remain strong were swiftly disappearing from his memory, and the _one_ reason who stood out beyond all others felt so very far away, so long moved on.

"_Where is your purpose now?"_

The knowing inflection of Mordred's whispering voice made him lift his gaze again, and he did not feel as strong and sure any longer; he felt fragile, as if one touch to the right point would shatter him completely…and Mordred knew exactly where his weakest place had always been.

Then, the mere thought of his king brought with it that old, familiar fire inside his heart. It mattered not where Arthur was now; all that mattered was that he keep his promise, the promise he had sworn to uphold for as long as they were apart. What, he thought in his mind where Mordred could not see, would Arthur say to him here? When his sapphire eyes burned into Merlin's, what would they plead for him to do? As it always had, it took little more than the image him to renew Merlin's strengths, and he held Mordred's gaze with more intensity than he had before, his voice strong as the Merlin from that time and with neither frailty nor insecurity.

"My loyalties lie only with King Arthur Pendragon of Camelot," he declared with his whole heart, speaking the English of the modern world as a symbol the timeless truth of his words. "I will not betray him for anything someone like you could offer me. It is in his name, and his alone, that my purpose lies. You should know that better than anyone."

Mordred's eyes flickered, briefly, with something black and frigid, and following it, his demeanor hardened into stone once more, his voiceless words becoming acidic and vicious.

"_You have no purpose anymore, Emrys. You cannot fool me; I know that you have been searching for a meaning for all these years since that day. Look, and you'll see that you should forget the faith you have in him."_

At that, the pale blueness in the eyes of the corrupt warlock was overtaken by a whispering gold, and in the depths of Merlin's imagination appeared a vision that was unlike anything he would have expected from his ancient foe. He felt it when his magic gave a jolt in his chest, and he could no longer even see Mordred standing there with him as the image filled his vision and took hold of his every attention.

It was Arthur, though no Arthur he had ever laid eyes upon. This Arthur was without a past, so very young and defenseless, with hair the color of unripe wheat and curling in soft, adolescent tendrils. Eyes, deeper blue than sapphires, sparkled with innocence and wonder which the older Arthur had lost by the time Merlin knew him. He sat on a hardwood floor with his small legs crossed, and in his hands which were without mark or callous, two, plastic knight-figurines battled.

As Merlin watched, this tiny Arthur's face changed telling expressions as in his youthful mind, the red- and blue-caped knights at his command made an agreement of battle. He set them both on the polished floor, one at the front of a tiny, red army and the other at the front of a blue one, and then he twisted and grabbed a pair of toy dragons from behind him, moving them so that they appeared to be flying in the air above the still soldiers, both creatures fighting gallantly for their respective kings.

_Our Arthur_, his voiceless magic whispered within him excitedly.

Merlin felt his eyes soften and tenderness spread through his body, which had been so long empty of any feelings at all except loneliness and growing despair. He found himself wanting only to scoop the child into his arms and smooth down the unruly, yellow curls with his own fingers, to tell him stories that would make him laugh that unbridled laughter, to protect him from everything—_everything_—that might harm him.

He blinked the tears in his eyes away, for somewhere in his mind, he knew that Mordred was still there, watching him with a gaze cold and calculating. Then, he noted something else which stole the breath from his lungs. In his many lifetimes never had he seen anything so inspiriting, for on the wall behind where Arthur played, a paper calendar hung, and on it symbols clear and bold declared the day to be October 13, 1989.

_Arthur is alive._

Somewhere outside the haze which had overpowered him, Mordred shifted just slightly toward him, and then the image changed before his eyes. Now, where the toddler Arthur had been sitting, there stood an older boy; his hair was a darker blonde, and shorter now, but the light of hope and strength in his familiar eyes was the exact same. The room in which he stood was dimmer than in the last image, a sharp line of orange across his blue shirt indicating the hour of sunset, and in his hand he held a plain, red backpack.

Merlin could not help the affectionate smile which touched his lips as he saw the poorly-drawn dragon on the corner of a worn notebook sticking out from the front pocket.

Then, just as quickly as it had appeared, his smile faded, for beside the young Arthur stepped another little boy, and this one he was terrified to find he recognized as well.

The child Mordred, whose face was forever seared into Merlin's memory from their distant past, took the backpack from Arthur, and the blonde boy patted his shoulder as his lips moved in what was evidently a farewell for the day, his mouth forming into that warm smile which Merlin had not seen with his own eyes in far too long.

The little Mordred said nothing, but his small hand reached up to pull the teal-coloured hood of his jacket over his dark head, and then he turned his steady fingers forward.

Young Arthur had only the time to blink in perplexity before Mordred's palm touched the center of his forehead, and Merlin watched, frozen in terror, as his beautiful-blue eyes clouded with murky gold like an instant poison.

Ten-year-old Arthur collapsed onto the dark-wood floor, listless eyes wide open as if having just woken from a nightmare; like a shadow, young Mordred drifted out of the room.

"_The Once and Future King was like a tiny flame in the night—easy to destroy with barely a breath. He will never reign again. And you, Emrys, have no meaning."_

Mordred's voice, mocking and damning, echoed from nowhere, the place where he had been standing empty and the room void of all light and life, the candles having flickered out just as the hope in Merlin's heart had done at the sight of his friend Arthur lying dead and cold…_again_….

A shadow quivered beside his own, stretched out across the room in the light from the hall, and he barely felt his own body moving as his vision blurred with the black of a wild fury he had never before felt seeping into his veins, controlling his body, his mind, _his magic_. The scream which tore from his throat sounded alien to his own ears, and when the darkness had trickled away from the edges of his vision, he found himself with his back against the doorframe, head spinning and chest heaving for breath, and Mordred was gone, though whether his enraged attack had touched him, he did not know…the whole world felt empty and dark, and he felt cold and alien in it, having nothing left, no hope for the future against the horror of this past. How long had he waited for his return, for the gods to grant him another purpose, to have reprieve from this terrible nothingness? And now, _this_...

He had failed Arthur before he even knew him.

* * *

"_Merlin, I hesitate to ask this, but…what are you doing?"_

_Merlin looked up from where he was sitting upon the stone floor with his back against Arthur's old, wooden wardrobe. His face, so young and angular and yet so filled with wisdom, was slightly wan with the past week's preparation of the harvest, in which they had had to fight off a vicious curse in the form of famine for the northern half of Camelot. The warlock responsible—a cruel-minded foreigner with self-inflicted burns like pictures decorating his arms and the sides of his face, and who was sympathetic with Morgana's cause due to the falling of his family in the Great Purge—had died a quick death by Excalibur once they had found him, but it had been the reaching him which had taken many days' journey through cool forests and much enchantment on Merlin's part._

_Said sorcerer, whose strange, whispering chants had died away the moment Arthur had voiced his name, stood quickly from his place and moved to show his master the ancient book which had been open in his lap._

"_I found it in that abandoned castle in the mountains. It is a book of enchantment," said he with an excitement Arthur would never truly comprehend, "speaking of the gods of the earth, and the power of the full moon upon all magic. It is a full moon tonight—"_

_Arthur turned his body halfway around and peered up through the window to the glowing orb high above them in the blackened night sky._

"—_and I thought," continued his companion, "that I would try to see if my magic really is stronger, like the book says."_

_Arthur gazed at the moon for another moment, the question which had been burning in him since he had begun to learn more about the art of sorcery leaping to the forefront of his mind at Merlin's words._

_His eyes tightened in consideration, and he bit his lip contemplatively as he turned back to his friend. Merlin, who could read Arthur's every move and action like the clearest of pictures defining his thoughts and feelings, looked at him with narrowed, sea-green eyes._

"_What is it, Arthur?"_

_Arthur sat back in his worn chair and regarded his old friend with something resembling awkward shyness, much to the warlock's evident surprise._

"_I was just wondering, Merlin," said he with some mild hesitation, "I know that you were born with your power already within you—"_

_The warlock smiled and nodded encouragingly._

"—_but Gaius did say that most practitioners learn to use magic. Isn't that correct?"_

"_Yes," Merlin conceded. "Nearly all of them do."_

_Arthur bit his lip again, once, and then posed his great inquiry._

"_Do you think I could?"_

_At the bright glow appearing in Merlin's eyes and spreading to his wide grin, Arthur hastily reworded his question with a nervous stammering he would allow only his beloved wife and loyal warlock—being the two most trusted in his entire kingdom—ever to hear come from his mouth._

"_That is, _if_ it's possible…I'd like to try it. You know, merely out of curiosity. Just to…know what it's like."_

_He felt increasingly bashful and warm, wondering helplessly if what he was saying sounded very foolish to Merlin's ears as the warlock grinned all the broader and set his ancient book, forgotten, on his king's writing-desk._

"_You'd really like to try it?" he inquired with a tone verging on hilarity, and Arthur thought in his mind how very unhelpful it was to his mounting discomfort._

"_It _is_ possible, isn't it?"_

_Merlin nearly laughed aloud before controlling himself, and then he was nodding vehemently, and some of the troublesome embarrassment dissipated from Arthur's mood immediately at the sight. His manservant—soon to be Camelot's new official sorcerer, he'd already decided, though Merlin had yet to hear the wondrous news—took a step back, straightened his shoulders, and stated eagerly,_

"_Let's try something small, then, all right?"_

_Arthur nodded, somewhat uncertainly._

"You're_ the expert here, Merlin, not me. Just tell me what I should do."_

_If possible, Merlin's smile grew all the more gladdened, and he seemed to be scrambling mentally to get his thoughts arranged. Once he had done so, he deliberately leant over a bit and blew out the single candle sitting between them on the writing-desk._

"_Watch, Arthur."_

_The king sat up slightly in obedience, and though it had been nearly a year since that first time he had watched the stormy shade of his dear friend's eyes flash gold in a moment, he still had not quite recovered from the pure and complete wonderment at the knowledge of something so great and powerful existing within his noble manservant…or_ why_ it was there. He could not understand how he was so very special, to deserve something to unique and precious as _Emrys_ to call his companion._

"_Bryne."_

_As though it, like the king, had learnt to obey Merlin's wisdom, the candle flickered alive at his will._

"_Now, you try, Arthur."_

_He felt the heat trickling to his face, and he wondered, briefly, if he was blushing, before he said with wholesome honesty,_

"_I feel a bit foolish. What if it doesn't work?"_

_Merlin chuckled quietly at that, but it was not in a demeaning manner; rather, it was in that strange way which made Arthur feel that Merlin may just slightly adore him at times._

"_Don't worry. It takes me days to learn some spells. You just have to keep repeating it inside yourself, and with your voice, over and over, until you get it."_

_Hearing the warlock of legend admit to having to practice enchantments for perfection of them comforted Arthur a bit more, and so he sat forward and blew out the candle decidedly._

_Merlin smiled again, this time a soft and gentle smile, and his eyes glowed now with a peculiar sort of peace as he placed his hand atop Arthur's wrist._

"_Now," he instructed kindly, "close your eyes."_

_Arthur did._

"_Take a deep breath, and try to relax your mind and body. The magic inside you is there—you just have to reach past everything to touch it."_

_Though he had always had an inborn instinct that prompted him never to close his eyes and release his guard in front of anyone, Arthur never even considered disobeying as he trustingly shut his eyes and followed Merlin's orders as best he could manage. It was then that he wondered if Merlin was not casting some helpful enchantment upon him through their contact, for as he inhaled and exhaled slowly, three times, he began to feel a strange sort of shiver—like the burn of a metal blade in frozen winter, but with no pain, only power—creeping into his very blood, starting at his heart and spreading through his whole body like a frightful, wonderful toxin._

_He felt it when Merlin released his wrist, and then he opened his eyes and murmured the word his friend had said, though he thought in his mind even as he said it how much more fluent it sounded on Merlin's lips._

"_Bryne."_

_It seemed that Merlin was more thrilled than he himself was when he felt his eyes change in an instant, the magic seeping through them to touch the wick of the candle and create a tiny flame. His warlock laughed aloud, freer than air, and cried exultantly,_

"_You did it, Arthur!"_

_He felt his answering grin, and stared in sincere awe at the flickering candle._

_Merlin rested his hand solidly upon his master's shoulder._

"_You did it," he whispered, and they both knew, as magic from the full moon began to whisper in the air for the first time in twenty-five years, that he meant so much more than just the little enchantment._

* * *

It was several seconds' time before Arthur realized his name had been called twice already.

He raised his head reflexively from where it had been perched in his palm, his other hand coming to slam almost painfully against the plastic armrest of the hard-backed office chair. He could feel the heat seeping to his face, and was grateful his cheeks did not pink with blush easily, because he was certain he would be an open book to anyone looking at him—the "anyone" being the prim, stringent, iPad-wielding secretary his father had chosen especially for him.

"Mr. Gregory," she sniffed, sharp green eyes magnified by her thick-rimmed glasses, "you are nearly twenty minutes late for your meeting with the board. I'm sure your father _would_ be thrilled to hear that you _haven't_ been frittering away your time in the break room, again."

Arthur opened his mouth, then closed it again as he recalled that to argue with Mrs. Osprey was nothing but a waste of the time she claimed she did not have. So instead, he merely stood and followed her through the polished halls of the Gregory Enterprises main building until she held the door of the conference room open for him, widely enough so that any attempt to sneak inside would be in vain.

As he moved to his place at the right of corner of the table, his father's sharp hazel eyes were stabbing into him from where he stood with either firm hand clutching the backs of two chairs on the right side of the table. The silver of his Armani suit and Versace tie only served to make his piercing gaze all the more—yes, Arthur was willing to admit it—frightening.

Pretty, blonde Kate, who was the senior Gregory's own personal assistant (Arthur still wondered but did not dare ask how _that_ was fair), kicked him beneath the table as he sat down across from her. He could offer little more than a helpless shrug as his father continued going over the profits of the past year and what Gregory Enterprises could do to encourage the support of their sponsors; within moments, Arthur's mind had wandered—almost of its own volition—back to his fantastic thoughts of minutes before.

He knew it should probably concern him greatly, that these dreams were evolving from simply dreams to consuming visions in the daytime as well. It should probably concern him that this _did not_ concern him, but that there was something else which made him more frustrated and unnerved than actually having these wild delusions. Regarding them, he could only bring himself to care about one thing, and one alone.

Try as he might, and though every piece of furniture and every other face from the dreams were perfectly clear, seared into his memory, where Merlin was, he could never remember a face. There was nothing visible of the manservant-turned-court sorcerer who existed in almost every one of his invented memories; there was nothing for him to remember of the warlock which haunted him—nothing but the voice in the dream.

* * *

Ten years had passed before they had begun to notice.

It had started off as nothing—nothing but a small jest here or there. He could still recall Arthur's voice the first time he made mention of it, the teasing laughter in his eyes as they'd sat at the breakfast table—he, Arthur, and Gwen—and the king had stated off-handedly as he'd reached for his cup to drink,

"Merlin, how is it that you still have so much energy? If I didn't know any better, I'd say you haven't gotten any older in the past decade."

Then, a week later in the hall, Guinevere had chuckled at how he had never seemed to lose or gain a single pound, no matter how long he'd gone eating thin stew and berries on hunting trips or how much excess bread he'd swiped from the castle kitchens after a grand banquet.

It was nearly three months after that Arthur had asked, in casual curiosity as they'd pored through old records in the castle library, why Merlin never had grown his hair out. His face—slightly more worn than Merlin's had been, and characterized with golden stubble so lighter than his suntanned skin—had fallen from his typical light humor to stunned and fearful shadow when his warlock, who had grown with him from the very start of his coming-of-age, whispered the truth of his unwanted immortality in words soft and unsure. He recalled Arthur's answers to his fears, the strong voice reassuring him that they would overcome this trial as his hand fell solidly on his shoulder, that they would get their answers to this unexpected mystery—_"together, Merlin, just as we've always done."_

Nearly thirty years after, Merlin had watched Arthur die an old man, while he sat beside him, alive and healthy and forever young.

* * *

The Isle of the Blessed never changed.

That was how Merlin knew the same magic that created it created him as well. The world around the isle grew different—the green of the hills on either side of the ancient lake withering to brown as settlers had come and polluted the magic from the soil, the pale sky, once clear and untouched, now often with a trail of dirty smoke from a passing plane or jet. The people living around it saw the small island in the middle of the nameless lake as nothing but a forsaken castle—a crumbling fort, perhaps, built by people from the past who no longer mattered. They never knew what deathless beauty rested in the cracks of these immortal stone walls.

Still, the modern world, with all its advanced technology and lack of time for the magic which kept it turning, could never be powerful enough to suck the life from the Isle of the Blessed. It was as eternal and mysterious as the moon, a constant in the ever-changing and darkening earth belonging to man. He had come here often in his many centuries of living, even abided here for a while in the beginning after he had left Camelot to new monarchs. He had left it after ten years, choosing to explore the world in search of a new and brighter future for himself, but while he had found many places on the planet with magic just as potent and preserved, the Isle of the Blessed was as close to home as he ever hoped to see again.

Oftentimes, it comforted him to step upon the island; it was treacherous, complex, and in the might of its dangerous power it gave him a peculiar peace. This time, however, stepping here brought him no feeling at all—not joy, or tranquility, or even fear. Nothing did anymore.

His face was as impassive as it had ever been as he walked the overgrown halls to the ceremonial, stone altar in the very center, where the priestesses of the Old Religion once had laid their flowers and perfumes to receive enlightenment of the gods of the earth and skies. The priestesses no longer existed, however, and here, in their place, he knew even before he arrived in the open space the two who were awaiting him where good sorcerers once had walked; he showed no surprise, for he felt none, when he saw the long-dead Morgana le Fay standing alongside Mordred at the far end of the place.

He approached them fearlessly, never pulling his eyes away from them. When he stopped mere footsteps away, they regarded each other for a moment in silence before Morgana spoke, her voice not even slightly altered in her new life, ruby gown showing none of the modern age in which it had been sewn.

"You have changed your mind, then, _Emrys_?"

There was a cruel edge to her voice, a wicked victory and dominance that made it clear what she saw in his presence here. They had won. A thousand years after he thought he'd triumphed over them, his life was empty, his spirit broken, his destiny unfulfilled, and they had beaten him without even having to touch him.

"I will tell you," Merlin said, the magic in his voice whispering echoes all around, and he would hold onto that; he would not show them any weakness or submission, even now, "where we hid Excalibur. I will give you the enchantment to wield it. You know that there is a time every three thousand years."

Morgana's and Mordred's eyes shifted only vaguely, but he could see it. He could see the desire scratching under their skins—desire for power, for revenge. The world of men feared the "addictive drugs," cocaine and marijuana and other pitiful stimulants; these were weak potions in comparison to black magic. The dark arts ate away at the users not in mind or body, but in soul. They were the true addiction, because they were alive in themselves and fed on hate and grief.

Merlin never had practiced them; he had done all he could to rescue poor addicts from their clutches, and been forced to kill others who had been too consumed by them to be rescued. Now, however, he simply let these two stand here before him, and he did nothing but speak what they wanted to hear.

"The night during this time is the darkest of nights," he went on, and he knew what he said, that it was what he had sworn never to utter, but he said it anyway, his voice low as he told the tale which most mortals would never believe. "It is the time when the veils between worlds are at their thinnest. The magics run between them all, for only that one night, as one line of magic, twined together like braid. It is then that your chance to wield Excalibur to its fullest potential can be fulfilled."

"_We know of all of this already, Emrys,"_ Mordred murmured in their minds, his face never changing. _"Why do you think we came alive again in this era of time? It is our destiny to wield it."_

"You have seven months from this day." Merlin spoke as though the younger sorcerer had never whispered a word, numb to their threats and to the passion with which they upheld them. "I'll not waste any more time playing games with you."

"You're going to give it to us," Morgana taunted, laughing skepticism in her tone, and he fought off an onslaught of memories long-forgotten, "just like that?"

"You can do whatever you want with it once you have it," Merlin affirmed, taking a step closer. "I won't stop you. But you must give me something in return."

"What is it that you want, Emrys?" Mordred questioned, slowly, sensually.

Merlin, for the first time, lowered his eyes to the soft grass at his feet, only for a moment, and then he raised his head again, and there was fire in his gaze.

"Help me die. If you swear to me by your very blood that you'll do this, I'll tell you everything."

As he expected, both faces fell in startlement at his singular demand, but then, just as quickly, the enemy sorcerers seemed to realize the depth and meaning behind his request. Merlin felt open, exposed; never before now had anyone seen the never-ending millennia written by time upon his face. He knew he would get no sympathy from them, but at least they would not refuse the chance to kill him themselves after what he had done on that battlefield. Perhaps it was better this way, for all of them; perhaps this is how the gods wanted it to be.

Perhaps this had been his destiny from the start.

"If that is what you desire," Mordred consented for the both of them, a grave but somehow glad light in his frozen eyes.

Merlin felt his own eyes dim of their own accord, for while he felt he should be rejoicing that he might now—at last—see those he loved and lost to mortality, he could not stop the sensation building within him, the one which told him he was betraying everything he'd ever fought for, that he was becoming what he had despised, or at least no longer saw it as evil.

Arthur's face flashed inside his mind, and he could have sworn that, for one, brief second, he heard the angered and saddened cry of his king—a figment from his memory, but real in its own way—demanding to know why…_why are you breaking your last promise to me, Merlin?_

He closed his eyes against the unreal sound, and though he tried to convince himself that he had no other choice, that he didn't deserve this anymore, that he did not have any reason to apologize for his actions, he still found himself whispering in the silence stretching on between them, when Morgana and Mordred could not hear, _"I'm sorry, Arthur."_

* * *

"_You taught me the values of being a knight—the code by which a man should live his life…to fight, with honor, for justice, freedom, and all that's good. I believe in the world that you will build."_

…

"_Even though I was a commoner, a nobody, you were willing to lay down your life for me, Arthur. It is now my turn to repay you."_

…

"_I have fought alongside you many times. There is no one that I would rather die for."_

…

"_I think we've no chance…but I wouldn't miss it for the world."_

…

"_Your enemies are my enemies."_

…

"_If you need an old man…"_

…

"_You know the answer."_

…

_A beat of silence._

…

"…_Merlin?"_

"_No, I don't really fancy it."_

"_You don't have a choice, Merlin."_

"_Okay."_ (1)

* * *

"Your father wants you out of Dublin and at least two-thirds of the way back to London by one o'clock in the morning, tomorrow," Mrs. Osprey declared curtly, never actually looking up to him from her iPad as her long fingers tightening around the pen. (Her fingernails were perfectly manicured in the exact shade of primrose pink, but it did little for compliment the bony, wrinkly appendages.)

Arthur shook off the voices still echoing around in his mind—that was all, this time; no faces, just voices, though he could accurately describe every detail of them. From Leon's strawberry-blonde, slightly ratty beard to Elyan's kind, brown eyes and kinder face, he knew with all certainty every face to whom each voice belonged…

…every face, that is, except Merlin's. Where Merlin sat, he could recall a flash of humor in his expression, but nothing more. He was always little more than a voice. Arthur had decided long ago that it was due to his lack of imagination that caused his subconscious to be unable to choose a face for the sometimes-manservant/sometimes-warlock; there were times, however, when it struck him that there might be a deeper and heavier reason for it.

It mattered little what the reason was, however, but only that it sometimes angered him that the one person most prominent in these invented visions was nothing but a voice in the dream. He could never move on from it until it was solved.

He grabbed his duffel bag from where it sat beside him on the poorly-polished airport floor and followed his dislikeable P. A. out into the cool night air, gladdened to finally be leaving the foreign city after the short but crude business meeting his father had forced him to attend.

Even as he walked along the cement strip where his father's private plane sat waiting, a feeling—dark and intense, almost sickening in his stomach—made him feel strangely unhappy. He let it carry him for a moment, and he began to believe his deepest instincts, barely even realizing he was…

…There was someone in danger…someone far away…someone _important_ to him in a way that he did not comprehend…

He wondered, momentarily, if it might be his father, but dismissed the notion. This feeling was deeper than that, somehow, like he had felt it before, somewhere….And then, he remembered the dream from nearly a year ago. An impossible labyrinth called Gedref, a sorcerer in white—the keeper of the unicorns, and Merlin; he'd had this same feeling then, in that dream, when Merlin had been in trouble and he'd dashed onto the dreamlike shore to find him. (2)

Then, suddenly, Mrs. Osprey was urging him impatiently into the plane, not waving or even smiling in farewell at him as his pilot took his seat in the cockpit and the engines began to whir. Arthur struggled within himself _not_ to stick his tongue out at the door when it closed and blocked him from her eagle-eyed sights.

The young heir never knew it when Morgana le Fay, hair waves of chocolate and lips red and wet as fresh blood, no longer under the pretense of bubbly-blonde Kate Coulby, whispered an otherworldly enchantment to seal his doom from an island they all had known well, in another life.

* * *

Merlin winced despite himself as Mordred's mind broke away from their union. He nearly staggered, blackness wriggling at the edges of his vision, but held his body firm and shook his head to dispel the pain in his temples from their connection. It had been a great while since his magic had overwhelmed him to such a point, but the secrets he had just opened for Mordred's taking were ones he had concealed beneath locks of magic for fear that someone might try to steal them from his mind. Here, he was breaking those locks himself; it was a strange irony.

Mordred's eyes were just fading from gold when he opened his own and their gazes met.

The vile warlock was smiling, a small, twisted smile, and Merlin knew that this was the point of no return. Mordred and Morgana's path to Excalibur was clear for them. He had no more secrets to keep, no more fates to protect. His life was over as far as any meaning was concerned.

Morgana, who had been standing near a half-broken arch in the western corner of the place so that he could not hear whatever spell she was casting forth, rejoined them and placed her hand upon Mordred's shoulder, murmuring into his ear.

"I'll be back shortly."

The younger wizard nodded, meeting her eyes briefly, and Merlin was curious what plans they had afore laid out which would warrant such intensity between them. But then, he decided, it mattered little to him what they did now; soon, he would never have to worry or care again. It was a selfish thought, the goodness in his soul argued, but he had sworn an oath with them, and he was too weak to fight for faith in a lost destiny anymore.

Morgana spared him a long glare, and he never broke it with even a blink; even after everything, he was not willing to allow her to see how truly broken he was. She finally looked away, her silken sleeve barely brushing his arm as she passed with all the grace of a phantom princess from another lifetime.

Within moments of her departure from their presence, an animalistic roar filled the sky, so familiar that Merlin's heart stopped in his chest and he turned to follow the sound. Emotion coming to alight his stony demeanor, his widened ocean eyes followed the movement in the heavens as the white dragon, Aithusa, brought alive again, as well—the first dragon to live in five hundred years, carried Morgana away into the distance. (3)

Though he knew Aithusa died in the same battle in which the wicked witch and sorcerer fell by his doing, because he was as evil and deserving as they, Merlin could not stop himself gazing longingly after the great, pearl wings until they vanished into the pale of the sky. He wondered what his father would think if he could see him now—the very last dragonlord left in all the earth, and the only dragon remaining being this one who would see him dead.

He wondered if Balinor would think him a coward as much as he himself did.

"_It is time now, Emrys."_

He turned at the voice whispering repercussions in his mind, and forced his shoulders back so that he was standing evenly with the other warlock. Mordred's eyes glimmered with a tiny bit of gold as he summoned forth his dark magic; that little glimmer was Merlin's end, and yet as he saw it building, he could feel only eagerness for it.

"_You are not afraid."_

"I have no reason to be afraid of you," he answered truthfully, in a hard voice. "You know that I am more powerful than you could be for another thousand years."

"_And yet you ask me to help you die. Is your magic not powerful enough to do this without aid?"_

Merlin felt his eyes flicker with emotion, and looked away, down at one upturned hand, in which his magic was pulsing in his blood just beneath his flesh.

"I don't know," he said softly, hauntingly. "I've never tried."

"_So you would rather that you allowed your enemies to kill you, than to face him with the knowledge that you did it to yourself."_

Merlin supposed he should be considering the rest of Mordred's declaration, but the only thing upon which he could concentrate was _"…face him…_;_"_ he would be facing Arthur again before sundown, and no matter what guilt or burdens he must confess to him then, he would _see him_….He would see all of them, and that was enough to make him care ever less for his sins.

Mordred seemed to sense the irreversible decision being made, and so he said, in finality,

"Very well."

Without another word or hesitancy, the younger warlock placed one hand flat over Merlin's heart.

"_Déaþ ór cwylþ, fǽgð, astrice! Bøan—"_

The colors of Mordred's eyes had just become overwhelmed with gold when, like a holy summoning, the skies turned black above them, and Merlin was distracted from the warlock's chant by the electricity suddenly in the air, the charge so incredibly powerful and clouds rolling with unnatural speed that his heart began to pound faster in his throat.

There was something wrong; he could feel it in his soul. There was something not right about this….

Before he could so much as move, white lightning came down upon them both.

In the next instant, Mordred was lying dead, uncolored eyes wide, and Merlin had been taken with the storm.

* * *

For the first time in over a thousand years, Merlin stood at Camelot's limits.

His eyes roamed over that place at the bottom of the valley, the exact place where the gates of the great city once stood—or, at the very least, the same position, for the passing centuries had long-since buried the real location beneath layers of dark dirt and rock, so that the shape of the hills remained but not any sign of the walls of the city which had once stood mightily upon them.

It was then that Merlin realized he had not left.

He nearly collapsed, his knees shaking beneath him, eyes filling with desperate tears, but his years had made him strong in many ways his youth had not been, and so he could only drive himself to move, to stumble down the embankment leading him to the center of the place which had once been his beloved home.

He had known…_he had known it would never work…_

Merlin lifted his face from where it had been buried in his palms, body still trembling but mind keen enough now to take in his surroundings.

He had returned only once after his initial departure, just in time to watch Camelot—irreversibly changed and corrupted after the era of King Arthur—fall to a foreign warlord. He had stood in this very place as the smoke curled to the sky, marking its downfall to the gods, and he had averted his eyes as the last star of the night disappeared in the west; all the while, he had thought in his mind Arthur's words from when they were young. _"They say the darkest hour is just before the dawn."_ (4) Dawn had come that day while he'd stood there, and the last piece of his life as the court sorcerer of Camelot had vanished with the night, so perhaps Arthur had been wrong in his hopes.

Perhaps they both had been.

"I'm here!"

His cry rang clear, echoing over the empty land as though he was the last flicker of life remaining in all the world.

Sometimes, he believed he was.

"This is where you wanted me. Here, where the castle stood in great Camelot. Isn't that right?"

He was not shouting now; there was little need. If the gods cared, they would hear.

"I did everything you asked of me."

His voice was hard, cold, and nothing like it had been, once, long ago…_too long ago_. It was the voice of the haunted, the _hopeless_, and he could not force it to revert back to what it had been then.

"I gave my life over to you and to the destiny you chose for me."

His words might have been Mordred's very own, but he knew they came from that dark place within himself which had been growing ever-darker since the day the corpse of the greatest king of Camelot was burnt to ashes on a merciless pyre in front of him.

"I watched them die."

There was a sound somewhere in the distance, like rolling thunder, building and then dying away again, and that was the only answer he received.

"_I watched them all die!_"

His hoarse scream startled even himself, but like collapsing a dam, he could not stop the raging waters' flowing once it had begun.

"You named me Emrys. The powerful one, the chosen one—the greatest warlock in all of history past and to come. I was victorious over every evil you allowed to threaten me. I lifted Camelot to its greatest glories; I saved it, preserved it. I protected your Once and Future King. I protected him with everything I had."

The trees at the edges of the hill shook with the power building within him. The wind spun around his in a circle, never touching him, like it feared the magic roiling inside him.

"_I loved him_. I loved them all. And you had me to watch them die; you took him from me, after you bound me to him…you forced me to let him go….I had to let them all go, and stay here alone…_Are you listening_?"

His legs collapsed beneath him at the sharp stab of pain in his chest. His magic was raging upon his emotions, tightening inside him like a knot of energy, barely containable, unstoppable should he let it break free. He considered it, for the barest of seconds, letting his magic explode from inside his soul and destroy the gods' creation for as many leagues as it could reach…but he could not do such a thing. Even now, when he felt as empty and lifeless as it is possible for any creature—man or magic—to feel, there still was no evil breeding inside his heart. There was nothing but sadness and _Why? What have I done to deserve this?_

"You left me here alone."

It was nothing stronger than a sob, and he did not know if he was talking to the gods now, or to Arthur.

* * *

The thunder echoing to Merlin's ears _had_ been the gods' answer to his brokenhearted cries.

It had_ not_ been thunder at all.

So distracted was he with the speech he was attempting to write on the sensitive keys of his high-priority laptop, Arthur barely heard it when the pilot of his private plane shouted in mortal terror, low voice muffled through the wall separating them. However deaf he had been to Sam's cries, there was no mistaking the sound of both engines' exploding.

He looked out the oval window by his seat; the flaming sunset on the horizon was nothing in comparison to the burning fires eating up the wing of the plane. With reflexes well-sharpened, he instantaneously left the thousand-euro computer sitting on the small table and reached back for the double parachutes behind his chair. Then, his entire body went cold as the movement of life caught his eye beside the broken wing of the plane.

Arthur knew that he must be losing his mind when he met the piercing eyes of the witch from his dreams, her blood-red lips smiling at him as she led the white dragon away into the darkness of the night sky.

Then, it mattered little, because there was not a parachute anywhere, behind his seat or in the storage, though he had checked it himself before they had taken off from Dublin and there had been three to spare. Praying that Sam had moved them, he dove into the cockpit with a sharp order for the older man to _call for help_.

Sam was gone, his state-of-the-art headset dangling from the board as though he had vanished into the air.

Arthur had never felt a rush of adrenaline so powerful before in all his life, and for one, brief moment, flashes—a thousand, overwhelming, wonderful flashes—filled his mind while he moved desperately throughout the failing plane. They were pictures, moving pictures, from his dreams…but not from dreams at all..._where they dreams?_...moments when a sword gleamed at his throat, or when a voice…Morgana, the witch…the one who'd done this…_she'd done this_…shouting spells of vile magic to destroy him…a dank cave…a cold dungeon…an autumn forest…his knights…Guinevere…_Merlin_…

He threw open the door of the plane, the wind whipping his hair, and it was too dark—there was nothing below, no lights, just forests, endless forests, _familiar forests_…he knew them, somehow…._How did he know them? _He could see nothing, hear nothing over the raging wind, so frigid against his skin.

He thought he heard a scream echoing over the trees below, growing frighteningly closer; it was a familiar scream…like the ones from his dreams….It was that voice…_the voice in the dream_…

He jumped.

* * *

Arthur heard his shoulder disjoint against the unforgiving ground in the same instant as the plane exploded somewhere nearby. He shouted, hoarsely…at least, the thought he did, but in reality, it was nothing more than a tiny cry, his broken ribs preventing enough air from moving through his punctured lungs to let him breathe easily.

The plane was on fire; he could feel the heat of the roaring flame beating like ocean's waves against the left side of his body. He knew he had to get far from it, or he would surely be burnt. He staggered dizzily to his feet, and crumpled again as his fractured ankle snapped completely under the burden of his weight.

He screamed again in his mind, but though he knew it never escaped his throat, he heard another scream echoing in his ears just the same.

He heard wings beat behind him…white wings…_Aithusa's white wings_…and feel her coming to finish what she had started…

There was a glimmer of silver on the ground near where he lay, panting and desperately searching for a way to fight. His gaze flickered to the metal object—his sword, the one he had had specially made, with a flat blade like the ones from the time of knights. He felt that his father had always thought it childish, his irrational love for Medieval weaponry and the codes of the knights which had wielded them; he might be angry should he ever discover his son carried one with him whenever he travelled, but Arthur would not tell him, because he himself had never known why he did so.

Now, with an instinct buried deep within him, concealed from even himself until this very moment in time, he half-crawled to where the somewhat dulled blade lay surrounded by smoke and debris. When his hand circled around its hilt, it seemed to bring with it a security he had never felt before.

The voice—the other voice screaming, _not his_—was shouting words in a language dead and old. He could hear the words forming, syllable for syllable, but could barely comprehend as they echoed, fading, over the night-blackened land.

"_...warlock…past…Camelot…Future King…loved…_Are you listening_?"_

He knew this meager sword would not be enough to fight the witch advancing upon him, and so, with the weapon held tightly in one hand, he ran. With broken, brittle bones, he ran towards the voice…the voice from the dream…_Merlin's voice_…

* * *

Merlin had crouched upon his knees, shivering in the darkness, alone, for not even a whole minute after his voice had broken to his tears. His sobs, having been building inside him for over a thousand years now, broke through his walls of strength, making him shake and tremble as though he would fall apart with it.

Then, a sound in the brushes close to him, and a sensation, familiar, wonderful, _impossible_ struck him deep inside his soul like a flash of lightning bringing a rainstorm after drought. His breath was stolen from his lungs at it, his heart skipping a beat and his tears stilled.

He barely had the time to stand to his feet before a bloodied body fell upon him, and then he was on his knees again, but this time, his arms were not empty.

He met the deep sapphire eyes, saw the _life_—a familiar, wonderful, _impossible_ life—glowing there before the blue was overtaken by relief at the sight of him, and then the wounded and broken man went limp against his breathless chest, the old sword he'd been clutching dropping from his weak hand to the cold soil.

Merlin's magic rose up again and he lifted his eyes once more to see Morgana's terror as she beheld him, _the Emrys_, her hard eyes dimming as she cowered away in fear into the dark forest; he blinked and she was gone with Aithusa in the night, but he could not pursue them….He could not _breathe._

Merlin looked down again, and it was Arthur's face he saw, emotionless with slumber and with a river of blood flowing down his cheek…but it was _Arthur_. He knew the angles of his king's face better than he knew himself.

His magic rejoiced.

_Our Arthur._

With shaking fingers, he turned the bruised face toward him, and it was so young and handsome, unscarred, like it had been when he'd been Prince Arthur, and Merlin a mere farm-boy in a new world, so many lifetimes ago.

In a wild moment, he wanted to laugh and weep again all at once. His eyes were opened again to his destiny. His faith was restored. His purpose was returned. His life had meaning, and it was lying in his arms, broken and hunted by ancient enemies, in need of him…_Arthur needed him…._

As he clutched this new Arthur close with tears on his face, thunder shook the ground of the place where their destiny had begun a thousand years before, and he _dared_ anyone to take it away again.

**To be continued  
(in Part ii)**

* * *

(1) The Coming of Arthur, Part 2 (Episode 13, Season 3), beginning at 23:41.

(2) Reference to The Labyrinth of Gedref (Episode 11, Season 1).

(3) A few things regarding Aithusa in this story: I keep seeing from unofficial sources claiming that the white dragon is actually going to be female in Season 5, but I went back to the episode in Season 4 when he/she was born, and Kilgharrah actually refers to him/her as "him." It will be several more months before Season 5 premiers, so I'm leaving Aithusa male for now; if he/she is female in the next season, please bear with my ignorance. (It's not my fault!) Also, some are saying he/she is not actually evil or sided with Morgana, but I like it better this way; it's just cooler! Arthur, Merlin, Kilgharrah—Morgana, Mordred, Aithusa. It's like chess (not that I know anything about chess; we play checkers where I'm from…:P).

(4) The Darkest Hour, Part 1 (Episode 1, Season 4), at 41:52.

* * *

_So…how did you like it? Please tell me the truth! I'd love to hear from any and all of you. And I feel I should tell you—there will be A LOT more dialogue and interactions between characters (two in particular..;)) in Part ii. Really. So I hope you'll watch for the next update!  
There also are several songs which inspired me during the process of writing this story; I though I'd share them with you, because they really are worth a listen. For this section of the story:  
I Still Cry by Ilse DeLange  
__Broken by Lifehouse  
Your Guardian Angel by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus (because it's, like, Merlin's LIFE SONG)  
My Immortal by Evanescence  
Check out these songs; they're pretty amazing.__  
__The time when I'll post Part ii depends on what sort of reception I get. ;) In the meantime, I hope you all have weekends filled with adventure, and remember that there's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it. Words of encouragement from me, Rin. :P_


	2. Part ii

_Well, I determined that it would be Thursday or Friday when I posted this second part. It's four thirty Saturday morning; I think it counts.  
Thanks to everyone who's read so far! I'm pleased to say that poor Merlin cheers up quite a bit in this part, and Arthur gets considerably more sarcastic (as Arthur tends to do when Merlin's around, much to our fangirling enjoyment).  
As I said in Part i, I am in the process of writing an original book, so any constructive criticism regarding my style would be very appreciated.  
Now, without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, Part 2…._

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Part ii**

_The war was beginning._

_No one would have ever known it. The Camelot outside the throne room of Pendragon castle was as beautiful as Arthur had ever seen it in all his many years as king. The perfect blue of the sky was interrupted only by gold-lined clouds as splendid as those artists painted upon canvas, the air sweet as the delicious scent of spring flowers danced upon the breeze, and for one, fleeting moment, he could almost convince himself that he could stand here forever—that he could set aside his heavy crown and lean against the window-frame for the rest of his life, gazing out upon the land he so loved._

_Even so, somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew these moments were precious and limited—perhaps more so than he even imagined._

_The storm was coming. It would not darken the sun or soak the earth with rain. No, this storm would do so much more than any thunderstorm could ever accomplish to his kingdom. This storm would set the future of all of Albion, whether it would dissipate or rule for the next thousand years._

"_Sire?"_

_Leon's voice from behind him broke through his wistful trance and he turned to face the round table which had replaced the rectangular one many years previous to this day. Seven gazes were upon him, each one bearing the same thought, searching him for the same thing—his leadership._

"_We will use the strategy Camelot has used since the beginning," he spoke to them without any hint of his fear in his voice. "We will fight them, straight on. We all know what we must do. We must fight, no matter the cost. So that is what we'll do, and if we die, at least let it be said that we fell in battle for the Albion the gods gave us to defend against the evil mounted upon us."_

_The five knights, his most trusted knights, despite whatever had once existed between Lancelot and his wife, looked solemnly at one another across the ancient circular table. Then, Gwaine—of all of them!—stood as tall and noble as he had been as a younger man, when he had been a drunk wanderer happening to cross their path in a rickety tavern, and held his sword straight out between them all so that the sunlight gleamed upon it from the windows._

"_Then…for the love of Camelot," he said, and it was not as loud or resounding as they expected, not even enough to echo against the sensitive stone walls of the place. It was quiet, flowing, and its simplicity was more powerful than a shout ever could have been._

_The other knights stood and joined their swords with his so that they made a strange flower of steel across the tabletop. One by one, they repeated the words of their comrade, as if it were a prayer for every feeling running in their veins, as if it was the one thing upon which they could rely in this war._

_Arthur moved to stand at his respective place amongst them, face softer and eyes glowing with more gratitude than he had ever felt, because they all knew what could easily become of them, and yet, here they stood. They had all believed in the world he would raise, and now, they believed in defending it with him._

_On Arthur's left side, Guinevere stood from where she was seated between his chair and Lancelot's._

"_For the love of Camelot," she whispered with more passion than a sunrise, clutching her slightly worn and aging hands together before her._

_On his right side, Merlin stood as well, with his shoulders back and eyes sharper than any younger man in the kingdom._

"_For the love of Camelot," he said in the voice so close to the long-disposed one of Dragoon the Great that Arthur sometimes wanted to laugh aloud at it when he remembered the first time he'd laid eyes upon the snarky old man in his chambers._

_This time, however, he could only nod._

_Merlin bowed his head once in answer._

_Arthur looked around then, to all the faces which had become more tired and timeworn over the years but were still somehow the same faces he had looked upon in an ancient castle many leagues from where they stood, when Morgana and Morgause had overtaken the kingdom with lies and secrets as their greatest weapons and thrown his father in prison for the hurt he had caused. They had become a legion then, the eight of them, and he never regretted that day, just as he would never regret this one._

_He took Excalibur from its sheath at his side and settled it atop the blades of his men._

"_For the love of Camelot," he declared, and at that, the knights put away their swords, knowing what they were to do._

_Without another word spoken, the five Knights of the Round Table exited the room and divided, making their separate ways to where they would lead their divisions of Camelot's army into battle._

_Guinevere touched her king's wrist. He wrapped his fingers without hesitation around hers and gripped her gentle hand as if she were his greatest treasure._

_After a moment of silence as loud as a tempestuous ocean, he released her and she pulled her hand back to her side; her footsteps echoed hollowly until the guards in the hall closed the great doors behind her._

_He could feel Merlin watching him as he stared for a heartbeat after the place where his still-beautiful wife had disappeared, and then, he looked to his warlock, their locked eyes speaking a thousand thoughts between them—thoughts which had been growing and increasing in potency for decades, now of trust and knowledge of their great destiny. After nearly forty years, sometimes nothing more was needed._

_Merlin turned to leave as well, to prepare for the evening ahead._

_But then, Arthur decided, sometimes a look was not enough. Sometimes, Merlin deserved to hear his heart._

_He grasped his friend's arm before he could take even a step away, and Merlin looked back to him with a light of question in his wrinkled but still somehow ridiculously boyish face._

"_I want you to know," the king said, no longer a king now; at this short, quiet moment in his life, he was a brother and nothing more, "that if everything else is lost today, you and Guinevere will be all that matter to me."_

_It was not as poetic as he would have liked, or as beautiful as what he felt in his heart but could not seem to form in his mouth, but it brought him peace to say it._

_At the end of that day, when the sky grew dark with night and the battle ended with more lives shattered than any other time in Albion's history, nothing else _did_ matter._

* * *

When Arthur opened his eyes, he was sure he had been kidnapped.

The room before his eyes was gray, brown, and musty—gray walls, brown furniture, musty décor. There were several dark stains in the short, eggshell carpet, and the incurable scent of lingering cigarette smoke filled his nostrils and made him want to gag in his throat. A thin sheet of pale sunlight shone through the slit between closed curtains at the tiny window before him, the light reflecting off the innumerable particles of dust in the air and making him feel as though he were still dreaming as he watched the dust float in a slow dance, invisible when it drifted out of the light.

There was an unlit lamp on the nightstand next to where he lay on his side, its shade sewn with a horribly retro-woodsy design and a black switch on its aluminum base.

He was reaching for it before he even knew what he was doing, but he stopped short at the sound of a voice, gentle and strange, behind him.

"You're safe, Arthur."

He felt a jolt travel all the way up his spine to the back of his neck. His breath caught painfully in his chest; he spun around beneath the dirty-feeling blankets to face the room behind him, and it took several moments before his eyes adjusted to the darkness of the place.

The rest of the room was much like he expected—ugly, plain, obviously some sort of cheap motel in the countryside. An ancient, thick television set perched on a stand made of plastic but colored to look like wood, a worn sofa was pushed against the wall less than a foot apart from the headboard of his bed, with a low coffee table before it which most unsavory guests had evidently used as a footrest while watching the telly, and in the small space beyond that, a kitchen with a broken ceiling fan was in total shadow.

He scarcely noticed any of this, however, for his eyes were locked upon the dark figure standing mere footsteps away just on the other side of the coffee table. He could not see a face, but it was a man, he knew, tall and lean and holding a mysterious sort of grace in his posture; it was no one he recognized, but then, how was the silhouette somehow so familiar to his eyes…?

"Who are you?" he demanded, his voice infuriatingly weak and hoarse…_What had happened to him…?_

It was true that he hardly gave the other man a moment to reply, but after a half-second, Arthur was pushing back the disgusting bedclothes and making to stand in barely-contained frustration and confusion.

"Stay still. It's all right," the voice said again, with more life and excitement in his tone, and if Arthur had paused for the barest of moments, he would have realized that this was a voice he knew well.

As it was, however, the young man did not wait to consider himself, but only grew all the more frustrated when he obeyed the stranger without really meaning to do so.

"Who are you? What do you want?" he demanded again, much stronger now, nearly trembling with the emotions he felt to leap for the door and see how far he could get before the kidnapper caught up with him.

His father had always said it was possibility for him to be taken as a hostage due to the wealth and fame of the Gregory family, but he had never before thought it would truly happen, and certainly not by a man like the one he was seeing. If he had been kidnapped (he wasn't sure; he could not remember a thing), it was terribly embarrassing to think that someone as thin and unthreatening as this man could manage it, and he sincerely hoped to escape without anyone ever having to know about it.

He could just hear Kate's relentless teasing now.

The stranger, once he saw Arthur was not going to move again, stepped calmly and quietly to the window on the other side of the bed.

The young Gregory said nothing, but never took his eyes off of him as he did so, though he still could not define a face in the shadows.

When the mysterious man pushed back the curtains and the subtle light of a cloudy day poured into the room, Arthur's breath was stolen again, but this time, he had no idea what the emotion rising in his throat actually was as he beheld the countenance of a young man, about his age, with tangled dark hair and a flash of mysticism in his gaze, pale blue against his marble-white skin.

There were a few heartbeats of stillness between them, in which the wide, oval eyes of the other man stayed locked up his own as though he was waiting for something, though Arthur did not know what, and then the blonde man questioned, slowly and with honest wonder,

"Do I know you?"

The other man's shoulders seemed to drop the slightest bit, but no other part of him wavered as he answered, with a tiny smile that seemed as though he were thinking of something else that Arthur did not understand (or did not remember, but he couldn't figure out why he would think that might be the case),

"I'm Colin. It's nice to meet you, Arthur."

"So I don't know you."

The peculiar feeling having worn away, even if he still swore in his mind that he _did_ know this "Colin" from somewhere, Arthur was now reverted back to his initial reaction of _what-the-hell-is-happening?_

Colin smirked, something different in his eyes now, and said,

"No."

"Right."

Arthur swung his legs over the bed before "Colin" could move to stop him, and when he placed all his weight upon the floor, his frustrations melted away in the wake of terrible pain all down the right side of his body.

His vision darkened around the edges, and when the blurriness faded away with the tears which squeezed out of his eyes, the strange young man was there, at his side, holding him up despite his slighter strength.

"You were in an accident," he heard him say softly in his ear. "You've got to calm down, Arthur."

"Accident," he repeated, the word registering after a moment when he had squinted his eyes shut once more to clear them completely.

He yanked his arm from Colin's grasp in his sudden excitement, the memories flooding back, though they were broken and scattered. There had been an explosion—the engine of his father's plane—and Sam, the pilot who had been hired to fly him home, had…vanished?

"Is Sam all right?" he asked before he could think about it.

"Who?" Colin asked, having taken his arm again, just to be safe.

"Sam, my pilot," Arthur clarified, feeling a bit silly that he had begun to tremble. "I think he…I'm not sure what happened to him."

He remembered Morgana, and the white dragon, but surely they had been nothing but hallucinations…a mixture of terror and adrenaline and his dreams, nothing more—they couldn't be anything more. And yet, his mind spun, his stomach churning at the thought of her cruel eyes.

"Sorry," said Colin, regarding him with some strange sort of intense curiosity, "I don't know. I heard the crash, but I never went to the plane. I found you in the woods."

"You heard a plane crash," said Arthur in astounded disbelief, "and you didn't try to find it?"

Something passed across Colin's face, and it appeared like guilt, but there was something else there as well which Arthur could not read.

"I didn't know it was a crash," the man admitted with a twinge of whiny defensiveness in his tone (at least, it sounded that way to Arthur), and then added, "I was worried about you."

"I don't care," the young heir hissed as he attempted to balance himself with his hand upon the scratched and dinted nightstand. "How long have I been out?"

"Nearly a day. I did all I could for you. You should feel almost entirely well by the end of the week."

He had to consider that for a moment, because he could recall the pain he had felt at the site of the crash, and surely he shouldn't even be able to stand had he been as hurt as he had thought he was then…?

"So you're telling me," he affirmed dryly, "you found me lying, bleeding, in a forest as a victim of a plane crash, and instead of finding the plane and searching for others, you decided you were going to care for me. _But_ instead of taking me to a hospital, you brought me to a dirty hotel room and looked after me yourself. Is that it?"

"My mentor was a physician," he offered, in Arthur's opinion, rather lamely.

"Oh, well, that just makes you a splendid candidate for the job, then, doesn't it?" He fought another hiss of pain as he limped around Colin toward what he hoped to be the door out, muttering about how his father probably had a satellite looking for him by now….

"Your father?" Colin repeated from behind him.

"Do you have any idea who I am?" he answered with his own question…more demand, really…as he spun around once more to face the dark-haired boy.

He knew he needed to leave, as quickly as possible, but there was something inside him that just compelled him to fight with this idiot, and so he did.

Colin actually looked as though he was trying not to choke on an ironic laugh, and Arthur wondered angrily how his question could possibly have been funny to him.

"I am Arthur Gregory," he declared, and was mildly surprised that Colin seemed to have no feelings of intimidation at either his name or the tone with which he said it.

"Yes, I know," he answered simply, removing a familiar object from the pocket of his obviously well-worn, khaki trousers. "I found your wallet. You really shouldn't carry around your social security number on a scrap of paper, you know. Someone might steal it."

Arthur, with the arm that wasn't sore, swiped the expensive leather wallet from the hands of the man (who he still gauged to be a kidnapper, by the way).

"Someone like you?" he snapped childishly, and Colin widened his eyes mockingly as though Arthur's accusation partially offended or confused him…or both. "And I take it you don't know who Anthony Gregory is, then; otherwise, you'd be very worried about what I tell him you've done."

"How I saved your life, you mean."

Arthur was momentarily taken aback, partly because no one had ever been entirely immune to his bad temper before in all his life, and partly because he felt that someone _had_, a very long time ago—someone much like Colin, but also the littlest bit different.

Colin, whose eyes hadn't been quite so bright at the start of this conversation as they were now, all filled with humor and life, was watching him with his brows raised in triumph over Arthur's legendary quick wit, his posture tall and proud and sure, not like it had been only moments before. If Arthur was good at reading other people—and sadly, he wasn't, most of the time—he would have thought there was pure joy alight in this weirdo's storm-colored eyes, but then he thought he must be wrong as usual, because what would this skinny, mad stranger have to be joyous about at a time like this?

Arthur started to say something, realized he had nothing to say (another uncommon experience), closed it again, and then promptly turned to limp toward the door.

"I have to get back," he huffed irritably, pausing only to grab his jacket—somehow totally free of blood or wrinkle, despite his memories of the grueling night of the crash. "If I'm gone much longer, my father might murder someone just because he can't find me."

"You're forgetting this," Colin's voice said helpfully from behind him.

When he hesitatingly turned back, his old sword, the one he had carried with him in the plane and which he had grabbed in his wild, hallucination-driven alarm in the crash, had seemingly appeared in Colin's hands, clean and gleaming in the dull sunlight shining from behind the young man's shoulders where he held it flat in his palms as a silent offering.

Arthur had to blink twice to dispel a heavy feeling in his stomach at the sight.

He stalked (as quickly and gracefully as he could, which wasn't very) back to where Colin stood, swiped the blade from his open hands, and returned to his task with just a dark look thrown at the other man when he smiled kindly at him. He opened the door (the knob didn't actually turn, so he just pushed on the thing as hard as he dared and knocked the door out of its stuck position) and stepped into the dimly-lit hall, which smelt even stronger of cigarette than the room had, calling cynically over his shoulder,

"Thanks so much for all your help, _Col_in, but I am leaving now."

When Colin skipped after him, nimbly wrapping a red scarf around his skinny neck, Arthur weighed his chances of running for it, but realized that he would not get very far without his leg collapsing—he was leaning on the wall as it was. There was no escaping this bright-eyed, high-cheekbones, much-too-thin-to-be-healthy creep, it seemed.

"You can't go by yourself," the other man told him sensibly. "You're still not well."

"I'll be fine," he said, teeth clenched against the fiery pain in his ankle.

"Where are you going?"

Arthur tried to step a bit quicker, because Colin was walking entirely too close to him for his comfort.

"London," he barked out in answer.

Colin stopped for a moment, but two hasty steps had him caught up to Arthur's pace again.

"Really?" he said, eyes wide and set upon Arthur's face. "Me too."

"Yeah, sure."

They rounded a corner, and he thanked God in his mind when the front desk was in sight, approaching it determinedly and ignoring the concerned looks he received from the seedy people eyeing the sword in his hand. As if they weren't all probably hiding knives with much worse pasts in their thick jackets and mountain boots.

"No, really," Colin half-exclaimed, keeping up with him easily. "I live there. How have we never met before?"

This last did not seem to be directed at Arthur at all, but the blonde man answered all the same.

"I don't know," he said, not going at all light on the sarcasm. "But I'm fairly certain it probably has something to do with good luck on my part—which apparently ran out at the plane crash."

They stopped at the desk, and he knocked, hard, on the cheap mock-marble top when there was no employee in sight.

When he looked to his left, he found Colin grinning as if the kid hadn't grinned in twenty years. _(He hadn't.)_

"Is there something wrong with you?" he asked honestly.

Colin looked to him, and, if possible, his grin only broadened at the peculiar look he was getting from the young Gregory.

"No," he said, and there was more depth in his answer than Arthur could have ever understood.

It wasn't until after he had called his father and spent twenty minutes reassuring him that he was fine (not mentioning the strange Colin James who stood at his side the whole time he talked and listened intently to every word), called the first taxi service he could find in the ancient phonebook at the desk, and sighed heavily as Colin settled next to him in the back seat that he finally acknowledged the peculiar feeling which had been troubling the back of his mind since he'd first heard this odd young man's name, and his breath was stolen away from him for the third time that morning.

Colin's voice was the one in the dreams.

* * *

Merlin never dreamt.

He _had_ dreamt. The magic in the air used to give him beautiful visions in the night. He could never remember what the dreams were, but he could recall the misty colors and soothing voices, dancing in his mind like a weight on a scale to balance the sometimes-hard life he had in the real world. He never liked to wake, but Gaius always had wondered how it was Merlin was always so cheerful in the mornings once he did. Merlin had just smiled and taken one of the apples he'd swiped from the kitchens the previous morning when he'd gone to get Arthur's breakfast.

After he had left Camelot, he'd dreamt of that castle, of long-gone Gaius and of Arthur, and Queen Guinevere and all the knights—all the things which had once been so precious to him and now were gone forever. He never had dreamt of specific things which had happened in those days—he only remembered dreaming of their faces, varied and _alive_, and of the sights and sounds in the marketplace, and of the whispering of the wind through the trees on journeys through the forest.

After a long while of that, however, it was as if the gods no longer cared whether he was at peace, even while he slept, and so those dreams had stopped as well. After that, he had dreamt only during thunderstorms, when the atmosphere was charged and livid with the energy. He could recall one night, on a Spanish ship bound for the Caribbean in the days even before the pirates, when the wind had tossed the little vessel in the ocean and the lightning came dangerously close to striking the crow's nest, he had truly believed himself to be on the back of Kilgharrah, gliding through the air at whole leagues each moment. That is, until he had awakened with the question on his lips of _"Where are you taking me?"_ and found himself in the cargo hold, surrounded by skittering rats and hard, wooden walls instead of glittering stars and freedom.

Mostly, storms only brought nightmares.

On this day, however, as the airplane cut smoothly through the air toward London, Merlin knew that should he fall asleep right this very moment, he would dream again, just as he used to dream, before he had ever become a man or a legend, when he was just a boy with a destiny full of wonder that he would never understand until he had fulfilled it.

As it was, however, he chose just to sit with his head resting against the side of his seat and watch Arthur sleep beside him, careful to look away anytime he thought the young man might awaken.

When the plane landed less than two hours later, Merlin, with more familiarity than he probably should have used, rubbed his thumb firmly against Arthur's arm to wake him, just as he had so many times when he had been a servant, and the other a prince, and he had not really wanted to disturb him because he'd known how tired his duties made him at times.

When the young man—_how very young he was!_—did open his eyes, Merlin wondered in his heart exactly who this Arthur was inside, because his sapphire eyes took a long moment to clear and alight with comprehension when their gazes met, and Merlin would have sworn that his lips started forming _"Mer—?"_ before he shook his head and asked what the time was.

As he followed him dutifully out of the plane and into the evening sunlight, Merlin vowed in his heart that he would devote however many decades he had with this Arthur to fathoming him out, to learning all the twists and facets of his complex character, just as he had once upon a time in a kingdom long-fallen.

Arthur turned as they walked across the field together and began giving him the Do's and Do Not's of regular first-class travel, with a twinge of condescending emphasis on the "…behave like a _normal person_…," like they were old friends and the other's presence was just a fitted piece in each of their lives, like they hadn't just met four hours previous in a musky country inn under the wildest of circumstances.

And Merlin did not care that he was a thousand and five hundred years old, or that somewhere in the world Morgana was whispering curses like a serpent in the night, or that, for the first time in centuries, he had no idea what the next part of his life might hold or what might happen in just the next hour. He felt as though the smile King Arthur had always called "childish and ridiculous" (and so said this Arthur, now, much to his entertainment) might never leave his face again.

His own laughter was strange and foreign to him as Arthur's eyes flashed dangerously at a group of EMTs who attempted to get a look at his healing ankle, the sound of it like a memory from a dream, so very long held inside him with nothing to draw it out.

When Arthur heard his quiet laughing close to him, he shot the warlock a brief, sidelong glance, and Merlin did not miss the peculiar recognition in his deep blue gaze.

* * *

"Father, I've told you, I'm _fine_. Colin took care of anything immediately life-threatening, and the rest is just like any injuries I get in a hard game of football. It was no one's fault, least of all Sam's, and I feel we should pay our respects to the dead and let it go at that."

Anthony Gregory, whose cold brown gaze was filled with concern existing solely for his only son, looked firmly into Arthur's eyes as he contemplated the words of the intelligent younger man, who had proven himself over the years, time and again.

Arthur kept his eyes locked with his father's, having learnt long ago that only the bravest and sharpest of men, those who showed no insecurity or lack of courage under the weight of the elder Gregory's judgment, were the ones who reached Anthony the deepest. It was doubly so for his son.

Anthony glanced once through the soundproof glass wall separating the offices in the Camelot Enterprises main building, to where the shabby-looking country boy called "Colin" sat. He looked highly out of place on the pristine chair in the upper-class place, as women in tight black skirts and men in silken ties glanced down at his mess of hair and plain-gray shirt, which hung a bit too slouchy on his slight frame, when they passed. Truly, it was somewhat difficult for the man to believe such a person was the savior of his son, but then, he must admit, there were heroes within the unlikeliest of people.

"Very well," he conceded, and laid a solid hand upon his boy's shoulder. "I am simply glad to see you all right, Arthur. It is the greatest joy of my life to have you returned healthy and relatively unhurt after such a terrible accident."

The younger Gregory seemed to relax as the mood in the atmosphere, so easily affected by his father's emotions when they surfaced, changed for the better, and his handsome face broke into a small smile.

"I'm glad to be back, Father," he answered with low sincerity, and though it may not have been the most expressive exchange one might imagine spoken between a father and son reunited after a near-tragedy of such extremes, to them, it was expressive enough.

* * *

In the parallel room, Merlin sat in a place that reminded him increasingly of Pendragon Castle, though none of the décor was so—in fact, it was the most sparklingly modern building he believed he had ever entered in this era; the very air just seemed to whisper with the same fated magic that the air of the castle had, as though the gods had placed protection along with destiny here as well. He had taken one glance into the eyes of Anthony Gregory and, though none of his pale and easy features were anything like the old king of Camelot, he had seen Uther, buried somewhere deep inside that soul. It had made him shudder not with fear, precisely, but with remembrance.

He cared little for the peculiar looks he received from shrewdly-dressed employees and civilians walking to and fro between him and the glass room where Arthur and his father now stood talking. The very experience of being here, though he had been in castles and palaces more grand and splendid than any over the centuries and had conversed with men and women more mystical and alluring than any of these everyday businesspeople could be, was enough to keep him on the edge of his seat with fascination. This was the modern Pendragons' dwelling.

Then, even as his eyes roamed over the walls and he tried to fathom what meanings might lay behind the strange contemporary art adorning the place, a different sort of magic pervaded the atmosphere.

At the corner where the polished hall ended and attached to a perpendicular hall, a young woman with blonde curls and venomous eyes watched him, her true intentions masked in a feminine corporate suit and company iPad.

Even with Morgana cloaked in her charade, and Merlin in his, they recognized one another as though there were no disguises or facades between them. Merlin was sure Morgana sensed it in her heart when he made his own known to her in just one look—one, intense look which whispered the secret vow which only the two of them would ever comprehend over the years and spaces between then and now.

_Not this time._

* * *

Morgana looked away from the driven blue eyes of Emrys.

Her footsteps echoed under the hard soles of her high-heeled, black shoes. She set the iPad down on her desk, shut off the computer, and exited the building, leaving the pathetic countenance of the motivated personal assistant on the elevator and exiting only as the dark creature she was.

Kate Coulby's life was finished; that part of the game was ended. Now, she was only Morgana le Fay, the legendary witch and rightful queen of Camelot, intent upon seeking her revenge and hell-bent to bring about the world she had been denied.

Merlin watched the place where she had been standing in the hall long after her presence had faded.

* * *

Unaware that his dear assistant had just left his employment without a second thought, Anthony removed his hand from Arthur's arm and became CEO of Camelot Banks and of Gregory Enterprises once more.

"You will take the rest of the week off upon my order, Arthur," he declared inarguably. "Only when you're entirely well will you be required back to your duties here."

"Thank you, Father," Arthur said gratefully, though he knew in his mind that he would be back before the end of the week, entirely well or not.

It was then that he caught a glimpse over his father's shoulder of the solemn expression belonging to the odd young man awaiting him (for some reason he had yet to fathom). He wondered, momentarily, what it was that had grasped Colin's attention and placed such an intent look upon his pale face, but then he recalled that this _was_ Colin, and Colin was obviously not a hundred percent in the head, even if he had saved his life.

Speaking of which….

"Father," he said as a sudden idea struck him, "would it be all right if I take Colin home? He did save my life, after all, and I don't think he has enough money for a bad cup of coffee, much less a cab."

Anthony took a slight step to the side and regarded the pallid-faced boy sitting silently in the hall, separated from them by a sturdy wall of perfectly clear glass.

"He is a gangly thing," he remarked, in a quiet tone, as he was wont to do when he was speaking mostly to himself. "Very well, Arthur. And do thank him on my behalf; I neglected to do so when you arrived."

Arthur nodded obediently and allowed his father to pat him once on the back as he left the orderly private office and approached his—_apparent_—savior once more. Even as he approached him, he could not fight that peculiar and insane desire to hear Colin's voice again. It was exactly the voice from his dreams; he would know the voice of his imagined warlock in a roar of other voices, the low timbre holding so much ancient wisdom and knowledge and the underlying vein of constant humor and hope.

He had asked Colin three times already since leaving the cheap country inn the same question, but each time he received the same answer, which made him feel rather foolish and perhaps a bit insane. _"Arthur, I am certain that we've never once met in this lifetime,"_ Colin had stated with uncompromising certainty. Though he knew the other man must be correct, why he felt a strange pang when Colin said so, he did not understand.

"Where should I get a taxi to drop you off?"

Colin seemed to jolt awake from a thick daze at the sound of his inquiry, for his whole body tensed at it; hands on his knees, he looked up at the young Gregory with an expression on his face which Arthur would categorize as his stupid look, if Arthur was one to categorize perfect strangers' expressions (which he hadn't been, until today).

"What?"

"Your _home_, Colin," Arthur emphasized a bit more than was probably necessary. "You do have a home, don't you? Or do you just take whatever room you can afford by nicking wallets?"

That old humor again, twitching at the corners of Colin's mouth and reaching up to light his eyes. He stood so that their eyes were even again, holding himself in that tall and proud way which shouldn't suit someone so little and obviously destitute, but did anyway, beyond all explanation.

"Well," said he with shameless glee, "not all of us have enough money for four full meals a day, _sir_."

Arthur felt his face fall to shocked at the pure fearlessness with which Colin had just brazenly insulted him—_him!_—and it was an expression he had never actually had on his face before, in all his life, because this was certainly a first for him…._Everything_ that happened around Colin seemed to be out of the ordinary, even by his standards, and for a moment, he was entirely unsure of how he should react to such an occurrence as this, whether he should find it enraging or madly funny.

Then, he saw the wide, foolish and absolutely ridiculous grin spread across Colin's face, and he couldn't bring himself to be the slightest bit angry, like he rather wanted to be.

"Did you just call me fat?" he demanded, and he would swear to his dying day that he _did not_ sound totally breathless and _did not_ look at all impressed by Colin's courage.

Colin shifted his weight, his impish countenance quickly gaining the innocence and sweetness of an angel, like he could change his whole being in the blink of an eye, and replied in a voice an octave higher,

"Of course not. Who in his right mind would say such a thing to the face of the great Arthur Gregory?"

Arthur leant toward him a bit more, careful to keep his voice down so as not to disturb any of the passing employees, and there was an inner battle raging inside him between anger and comedy.

"Are you lying to me, _Col_in?"

Colin's eyes grew wide with what could have been true fear, if Arthur didn't already know better than that from him.

"Arthur, I would never lie to you. I respect you far too much for that."

When the young man turned and began to walk with a hastened pace back in the direction of the front door, his worn-out, discolored sneakers making a faint squeaking sound against the clean floor of the hall, Arthur was left feeling more awed by this strange boy than he had ever been by anyone before.

* * *

Merlin watched Arthur with intent eyes as they moved through the evening traffic of London's streets. He tried as best he could to remain subtle and unobtrusive, knowing as well as he did that Arthur despised having attention forced upon him, but he could hardly fault himself for wanting to watch, to relearn all of those irritating and endearing quirks which made Arthur who he was, to watch those long-forgotten expressions flit one by one across his handsome face.

He had almost forgotten how Arthur looked when he was thinking so deeply, the way his blonde brows knitted together and how he pressed his knuckles against the side of his head with his elbow resting beside him, the fingers of his other hand tightening around once the wooden armrest of his chair before the fireplace of his rooms, and now his own knee as the car maneuvered easily through the busy roads.

Something shifted in Arthur's demeanor all in an instant, like his thoughts had unexpectedly turned to something different than what he'd been considering. A mist overcame the dark blue, like a trance descending upon him; there was something deep inside those eyes. Merlin could feel it manifesting itself in that moment. It was something knotted tightly within Arthur's soul—the very same soul which had once belonged to a king. Arthur knew it was there; he knew he was special, but he did not know how or why, and this—whatever it was that arose in his mind which whispered his uniqueness to him—was what Merlin must interpret to him.

This was his destiny, and so he watched closely.

* * *

_Years later, a king Arthur would look back upon that period of his young life as prince and feel foolish for his blindness, for those weeks in which he should have known the truth—should have seen it in Morgana's eyes when he looked into their murky depths, and _known_ that something had changed inside her forever._

_In that day and time, however, the young Pendragon hardly cared for anything except to be a great ruler in the eyes of his father and their people…and to feel the pressures of this heavy destiny melt from him in the form of the needless and unexplainably fun taunting of his longsuffering manservant._

"_What are you hiding behind your back?"_

_That innocent and guilty look which both fascinated him and drove him completely mad all at the same time lit up across Merlin's face as he rounded the corner and was obviously startled by Arthur's voice. Merlin was never startled unless he was hiding something._

"_Nothing. See?"_

_At that, he produced both his hands, empty…but then, he'd played that trick before._

"_What are you up to?" he demanded in his lowest tone, which had absolutely no effect upon his frustratingly bold manservant except to encourage him to laughingly answer,_

"_Nothing, honestly!"_

_The did a little half-circle of a dance, and Arthur could have sworn the back of the boy's jacket was folded up a bit, like there was something stuffed in the narrow belt he wore daily, but it was impossible to be sure when the overly energetic boy wouldn't stand _still_ for longer than a heartbeat._

"_Arthur, I would never lie to you," Merlin continued, and looked him straight in the eye so that it was also impossible to know if he was being serious or not. "I respect you far too much for that." _(1)

"What are you thinking?"

Arthur had to hold himself steady to keep his shoulders from jerking at the noise—however quiet Colin's voice had been beside him—which tore through the vision and sent it scattering like a computer screen losing power abruptly. He hid his reaction from the other man (because he may be dauntless in his expression, but he had never liked to inflict any negative emotions he had upon others at whom they were not directed), but a flare of frustration arose in his chest. He had been close that time, he thought; he'd _almost_ caught a glimpse of Merlin's face in the blur….

"Nothing," he said, pushing away whatever remained of the vision as he firmly told himself that this was not the time. "Just a dream."

"What's the dream about?"

He turned his head to face the young man, wondering if all people from the country unreservedly ignored basic manners in favor of their own curiosity, or if it was just _him_.

Colin merely blinked like a young owl totally unable to be deterred.

"It's _nothing_, Colin," he insisted, even as he shook his head at this extraordinary boy (though whether he was extraordinary in a positive way or a negative way, Arthur was yet unsure). "It's _just_ a dream."

Colin quirked his head and shifted his eyebrows just enough to be clear.

"Are you always this irritating?" Arthur asked with candid interest, even as their car rolled to a stop in front of a building the Gregory would not recognize, for he had not seen hardy anything but his own thoughts this entire trip.

Colin smirked and shrugged.

"It's just one of my many gifts."

…"_Were you born clumsy or do you work at it?"_

"_It's just one of my many gifts."…_ (2)

The sound of Colin's car door closing seemed to grow distant for a brief moment as the faint voices drifted through Arthur's mind—his voice, and Colin's, but not them….

He shook himself, and watched through the window as Colin took three steps toward the peeling brown door of the building where the car had stopped. He felt the sharp urge to follow him, to leap out of the cab and go after him no matter where he was going…and then he felt he wouldn't regret it if he did, and he wondered from where such a wild thought might have come. More than that, he wondered why, of all people, it would come for this man, whose hair was uncombed and red scarf tattered on the ends, whose ocean eyes whispered to Arthur in a language like from a dream…

…_and whose voice did even more so._

Colin turned back to glance over his shoulder and, seeing Arthur's car door remained unopened, reversed his step and yanked the door open for himself.

Arthur cried out indignantly as he nearly fell out upon the sidewalk.

Colin leant down and blinked, twice.

"You coming?"

"Why would I do that?" Arthur returned, with only a minimal amount of sincerity compared to the skepticism in his face.

"Because I have medicine for you," he said, leaning back as a voiceless urge for Arthur to step out.

The young heir raised one eyebrow but did not move otherwise, his stubbornness holding out against Colin's enigmatic dominion.

"So you're a drug-dealer," he deadpanned, and something about it didn't surprise him.

(It did actually surprise him, however, that he wouldn't even mind if it were so.)

Colin rolled his eyes and pulled the door open further.

"Of course not," he said longsufferingly. "I told you—my mentor was a physician. They're natural healers."

"Natural healers."

"Yes."

"No, thanks."

Colin huffed; he actually _huffed_ at Arthur Gregory, and bent back down to meet his eyes.

"Has the pain in your leg gotten worse or better in the past two hours?"

Arthur considered this for a long moment, shifting his ankle and feeling the dull fire flare up more powerfully than it had when he'd gotten into the cab less than twenty minutes previous.

"See?" Colin continued, having read Arthur's face and dispelling any hopes the other man have had to lie. "My healers have worn off. Now, come on…._Arthur_."

Arthur took a quick glance into the pleading green-gray eyes and tossed some money at the driver of the taxi with an unintelligible growl.

* * *

Merlin reached an obstacle when it came to the front door of the building. So used to appropriating his magic, he almost forgot that it was considered normal to use a key when opening doors. Fortunately for him, Arthur was distracted with absorbing their surroundings and was not concentrating upon his new friend's movements.

Merlin had to pause for a half-moment and absorb that. His new friend. He was Arthur's friend.

He held his hand up and felt his eyes flash as the door unlocked itself.

"This is really where you live?"

The atypical solemnity of Arthur's voice grasped his attention. When he turned, he found his friend's face had softened and he was watching two young children sitting on the steps of a drugstore two doors down, past the tattoo parlor and the pub, as the little girl played with an old doll and her younger brother spoke in Russian to her while he tugged absent-mindedly on his too-small shirt.

Merlin felt his own eyes dim at the sight and thought that he would conjure a new sack of fresh vegetables and a couple of golden rings on their doorstep, for he was sure the food and money he had left for them several weeks previous would have run out by now.

"Yeah," he answered the young man's inquiry, as the front door groaned open under the influence of his magic. "Not what you're used to, I'm sure."

At that, Arthur looked to the ground, as though ashamed to be standing in such a place with the knowledge of who he was and what sort of conditions he had to which to return.

Merlin felt a smile pulling at his lips as a rush of affection washed over him at the sight. He laid his hand upon Arthur's arm and urged him gently inside the door of the apartment building.

"Some people," said he as he led him up the narrow staircase toward his own flat, "were meant to be born into riches, and some were not. That doesn't mean we're not happy; there is much more to make one happy in life than what luxuries he can afford."

"Yes, I know," Arthur answered behind him, as the steps squeaked under his feet, and he did not speak in any way condescending, but in a murmured accord. Then, he asked, as though the thought had struck him and he needed to voice it, "What about you, Colin? Are you happy, then?"

Merlin waited until he had reached the light-tinted door of his flat before he lifted his eyes to meet Arthur's and smiled. He looked down again at the knob and flipped his wrist so that the door clicked as it unlocked itself.

Arthur's eyes widened as the knob flipped without Colin's outstretched fingers ever touching it, but then he blinked uncomprehendingly at Colin, as though searching for any sign that he had seen what he thought he had.

"I am," Merlin answered in a near-whisper, and entered into the darkened flat.

* * *

Arthur followed him, still slightly unnerved and unsure of what, exactly, he'd seen; still, he felt no insecurities upon entering Colin's shadowed rooms, despite the lack of wisdom that could be behind his choice to do so. He knew his father would not approve; he could hear his warning voice in his mind, that low tone which used to make him hold his breath as a child, reminding him that he'd not known this man for more than a day, and this was the "destitute" part of the city, that he had no business being here when he had a grand flat of his own at which he could be recuperating.

But there was _something about him_, this strange young idiot called Colin James, and Arthur could not turn away. Anyway, found himself desiring those "natural healers" as he started to limp badly again.

Arthur found himself in a hall almost too narrow to squeeze through, with a closed door on his right and a blackened room before him at the end. He blinked for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, and saw Colin's silhouette moving near to him. A spark of fire suddenly appeared with the audible swipe of a match, and then three candles were lit on an escritoire against the wall on his left, the triple glow of the flames multiplied by their reflections in the brass-framed mirror hanging just above the table.

Colin maneuvered around him, unwrapping his russet scarf from around his throat and moving toward an antique iron hat-stand beside the front door.

"Don't you…" Arthur trailed off, not wanting to sound rude, because though Colin had been grating upon nerves he didn't even realize he had until this frustrating day, he had no desire to anger him (or disappoint him, but he didn't really understand that notion, so he pushed it away).

Colin looked to him sidelong.

"What?"

"Can't you…afford lights?" Arthur managed, hoping that was at least partially tactful in wording.

Colin chuckled lightly, dispelling his anxiousness all in an instant.

"I don't like them," he stated simply. "They irritate me."

"Right," Arthur said, drawing the word out into three syllables, and glanced back to the three candles to see where melted wax had hardened all around them from months of use. "You might not be saying that when you come home to find the whole building's burnt down and _you're_ to blame for it."

"That won't happen," Colin declared, looping his scarf over one of the curved rods of the hat-stand.

"You seem very sure of yourself."

"I usually am."

"I can see that."

As Colin went around him again, smirking that infuriating and somehow captivating smirk, Arthur caught glimpse of something he hadn't noted before; a tiny circular shape stood out against the gray fabric of Colin's shirt below his collar bone, hidden previously by the red scarf he'd been wearing all the day. It was a ring; that much was obvious, and Arthur found himself wondering what it might mean and why Colin kept it so close to him.

"Are you thirsty?"

Colin's voice broke Arthur from his contemplation, and he snapped his eyes up to meet the other man's.

"Ah…yes, thanks," he replied hastily, for the last thing he wanted was for Colin to think he'd been staring out of interest.

Colin smiled, and maybe he rolled his eyes as he turned toward the darkened end of the hall, but Arthur couldn't tell for sure in the shadows made by the dancing candlelight.

"Come on, then," the smaller man called after him, and so Arthur followed.

Somehow, he was starting to think he always would.

* * *

"So."

Arthur's heavy, conversational sigh filled the once-silent air of Merlin's kitchen as the warlock poured a cup of water for him. (Arthur initially had been extremely unimpressed that he'd had nothing more to offer, but had consented when the realization had struck him that Colin didn't even have a refrigerator). Merlin turned and set the cup before him as the younger man put his hands behind his head and leant back in his chair.

"Do tell, _Col_in—what, exactly, were you doing creeping around in the woods all alone in the dark?"

Merlin settled in the chair opposite him and placed his elbows on the table. He took a slow sip of his own water as he considered his answer. It had been little more than two days ago, and still the creature he had felt like he was then seemed so vastly different from the one he felt himself to be now that he wondered how the two of them could possibly be one and the same. The world had felt so endlessly black for those cruel hours, and he had felt lost and forgotten in it; he'd felt as though it had changed him forever, that there was no returning to that spirit of light he had once been. He'd believed his soul to have become immortally dark and cold, broken through by the harsh world and unable to be put together again.

Now, that all felt as distant as his furthest memories, because he was not lost and forgotten, after all.

"Colin? Are you going to answer me or stare off into space like a fool?"

"I just…"

He trailed off, and though it was rather hysterical of him to think so, he was actually thrilled to have to be lying to Arthur again in order to spare him from a truth he wouldn't comprehend, _"like old times,"_ a nostalgic man might say in this modern age.

He smiled to himself as he thought of the times when he'd laughed at Gaius for saying such things.

"…had something I thought I had to do," he ended with more mystique than he actually intended, if the look on Arthur's face when he looked back up to him was any indication.

The blonde man did not appear at all impressed by his new friend's answer, and he repeated it, slowly.

"You had something you thought you had to do."

"Yes."

"And it turns out that you didn't?"

"No." Then, abruptly, he reconsidered. "Well, maybe."

"Maybe _what_?" Arthur rhythmically tapped his knuckles on the tabletop with impatience at the complexity of the answers he received, being, as he was, a man who believed in simple and frank honesty as the best manner of communication.

"Maybe I _did_ have to do it," Merlin replied, too lost in his own revelations to pay any heed to the mounting annoyance of the other man, as he began to understand, for the first time, at least a partial answer to his centuries-old question of _why?_

"All right." Evidently, Arthur was through attempting to make sense out of the senseless, and so he rested his ankle—the one which was not still sore—on his knee, and though he would never even think it, his pose was as regal as if he were a king sitting upon his throne. "If you're not going to tell me that, at least tell me your last name. I might need it if you turn up to be a kidnapper. Or a drug-dealer."

"It's James," he replied without hesitation; it had been his name for twenty years now.

"Well, _Colin James_, my father asked me to thank you for saving my life, so, on his behalf, I will. But _I_ happen to think you're an idiot, so you can imagine why I don't give my own regards."

"That's fine," Merlin granted him permission with the raising of his cup. "I happen to think you're a prat."

Arthur laughed—not quite the perfect Arthur laugh Merlin remembered, but closer than he'd heard in much too long.

"You really are a brave one, aren't you?"

"Maybe I'm just an idiot," Merlin answered, because no amount of years or wisdom could ever change that; this he'd decided long ago, when King Arthur had deemed it necessary to put his seal of protection upon him, no matter how many times he'd declared he didn't need it.

"What's that?"

Merlin followed Arthur's gaze to his throat, where he had unconsciously pulled his ring—his most precious possession—from beneath his shirt, as he was wont to do when he was recalling his past. When he lifted his eyes back to Arthur's, he realized that the look he could see in his sapphire depths was one close, so very close, to recognizing.

He pulled the chain over his head and held the ring out, so that the dim sunshine from the window would glimmer off of its dulled and scratched surface and Arthur could see it clearly.

"A friend gave it to me," Merlin said, quietly, watching the other man's face as he spoke and praying for a visible glimmer of understanding to appear, "many, many years ago."

Arthur watched the silver ring sway gently between them. The ring was not much at first glance, certainly—just a piece of silver with too many flaws to make it valuable to the average person. It was definitely not something he himself would consider valuable or interesting, and yet, as his eyes caught glimpse of a mark on the outside of it, he found himself leaning closer to get a better look.

"What's that marking right there?" he inquired, because the metal was too faded and dinted from years of misuse for him to fathom it out.

Merlin's eyes softened even as his heart sped up the slightest bit.

"It's a dragon," he answered. "It was the symbol of his household."

Arthur's eyes flickered to Merlin's pale face.

"Were their knights in his ancestry?" he asked with a sudden greater fascination.

Merlin looked away, one side of his mouth quirking up into a half-grin.

"Something like that, yes," he said, and dropped the ring into the palm of Arthur's hand.

Arthur made a sound of interest, and held the ring carefully by his fingertips, turning it over so that he could see each side.

"It looks very old," he remarked.

"It is," came the reply, "over a thousand years old." A heartbeat, and then, "It belonged to a king."

Arthur's eyes widened and he looked back to Colin's face to ensure he'd heard correctly.

"Really?" he said in wonderment, suddenly much more fascinated than he had been before, as his dreams—castles, thrones, a world of kings—drifted across his mind not forcefully enough to be consuming, but just enough to draw him to anything Colin might tell him. A room stood out in the back of his mind, _his_ room—at least within the dreamland—and a small laugh, Merlin's laugh (_Colin's_ laugh), drifted like an echo through it.

Colin nodded, smiling as he leaned forward as well.

"King Arthur," he said, tilting his head as the other man continued to scrutinize the tiny piece of ancient metal.

Merlin's heart dropped a bit as Arthur chuckled lightly at his words, and the flicker of memory was gone from his gaze.

"Come on, Colin," said he, laughingly, as his fingers loosened around the ring, "you can't really believe that. _The_ King Arthur?"

"Yes," he said, surely but wistfully.

"Your friend must have lied to you, or had someone lie to him," Arthur stated, turning the ring back over to Merlin's hand. "Surely if it belonged to King Arthur, it would be in a museum somewhere, and not in the hands of a hopeless _boy_ like you."

"I'm not a _boy_," muttered Merlin indignantly as he replaced the chain around his neck.

Arthur rolled his eyes, but could not help but chuckle at how much Colin looked like a little boy denying it.

There were several moments of silence after this, and while most moments of silence made Arthur exceedingly awkward, no matter who he was with or why, this was entirely different. It was without pressure or discomfort; it was _easy_.

After several, slow ticks from an unseen clock, Arthur glanced up discreetly to Colin's face.

The other man was staring at Arthur's hands where they settled upon the table, as though he was lost in thought as well, and so the young Gregory took the moments and tried to fathom him out by watching his thin and pallid face. He didn't_ understand_ him; nobody was ever this way around Arthur, much less after they'd learnt of his father's name and seen the grand banks which had made the name famous amongst high society. Just Arthur's own presence, without any of the Gregory legacy behind it, seemed to make others anxious to speak, or jittery enough to drive him crazy, until he either cleared his throat, _loudly_, or made an excuse to leave altogether.

Kate had once told him that others reacted this way to him because he had the aura of a king. He'd thought, after she'd remarked upon it, of his dreams, and how the fictional people of his mind behaved around him, _King_ Arthur, and then he'd decided she might be right.

In his few months of employment at his father's workplace, he'd made the sharpest of businessmen from the richest of foreign countries sit up and pay attention to what he said. By all standards, _Colin James_ should be the easiest to manipulate—a poor, skinny, strange little nobody who'd happened to stumble across his path. He should be intimidated, awed, by this young, popular celebrity; he should be terrified to offend him and eager to impress him, just as everyone else seemed to be.

Colin was none of these things.

Arthur could just hear the Merlin in his dream laughing at his confusion. He wondered of Merlin would approve of Colin, and then shook those thoughts from his mind and repeated over and over how it didn't matter, because Merlin wasn't real, and Colin wasn't all that unique and fascinating, and he didn't sound very much like the voice in the dream.

If he had allowed himself to dwell upon it for a moment longer before cutting off these musings, perhaps Arthur would have known all of the things he tried to make himself believe were lies.

* * *

After several more ticks of the clock, Merlin looked up to meet Arthur's staring eyes.

The man looked away, as though embarrassed to have been caught watching. If only he could know, Merlin thought within himself, how long the warlock had waited for Arthur to look at him like that again—bewildered, flustered, in awe of him. He wondered if he might see that look in its fullest capacity, the way it had been when Arthur had first watched his magic make glowing shapes in the air that first afternoon after he had accepted it in his courageous heart.

He could only imagine what kind of amazement would come alive in Arthur's eyes in this modern world of skeptics, should he see the magic.

"It's nearly six-thirty," Arthur said with a glance at his wristwatch. "I need to leave. Where are those ridiculous 'natural healers' you were going on about?"

"Oh, right." Merlin stood hastily. "Here, follow me."

He led Arthur out into the hall, into the dark room across, where he flicked on a few more candles with an entirely fake match.

Arthur sucked in a breath at the clutter he saw surrounding him as soon as the candles came alight.

"Haven't you ever heard of organizing, _Col_in?"

"Ah. Um…"

"What is all this mess?" Arthur asked as he couldn't resist peeking under a quilt where dust settled so thick that the colors of its pattern were veiled beneath it.

The frozen, angry face of an alabaster dog snarled at him but didn't blink. (3)

Colin was giggling slightly at him when he looked back up, and then his ash-gray shirt vanished around a larger form of what appeared to be an cemetery angel, but it was impossible to be certain when the figure was masked in a white sheet.

"Here's the medicine," called Colin's voice, followed by the tiny sound of a squeaky cabinet door. "But remember not to drink it all at once. It could give you a bad headache if you do."

…"_I wonder."_

"_What?"_

"_Most of the men in my family have deteriorated in mind at the end of their years. I wonder why haven't I begun to do the same yet; I don't even feel very physically weak, really—only a little stiffer and less energetic than I used to be. Perhaps it's coming when I least expect it, eh? The castle will wake up one morning to find their king suddenly bed-ridden and blowing kisses at handmaidens and whatnot."_

"_I don't think so, sire."_

"_Really? And why is that, _Mer_lin?"_

"_Never mind, Arthur. Here's your tea. Remember not to drink it all at once. It could give you a bad headache if you do."…_

"Thank you," Arthur murmured, pushing away the words whispering like memories at the forefront of his mind; he was becoming good at it by now, he realized, controlling these mad visions of his. He wondered if that was the next sign of insanity.

Colin relinquished the little bottle to his outstretched hand with a nod.

Arthur ran his eyes over it, and wasn't sure if he was or wasn't surprised to see that the bottle was small and made of glass, with no label or tag, and a deep golden liquid inside with just the barest tint of blue-violet. It was glittering in his eyes, warm against his palm—like it was alive.

"What did you say this is made of?" he asked, and he had no idea what the eagerness of his tone even meant to himself.

Colin tilted his head and blinked.

"Natural…stuff," came the wholly unhelpful reply.

"Right," he said, but dropped it in his pocket without worry.

Colin grinned at him and when the grandfather clock on the wall behind him began to chime deeply, announcing the half-hour past six, they both looked to it and left out into the hall once again, where the honey-wax candles hadn't dimmed at all on the side table. Arthur shivered in the chilly air, and realized that there was probably no heat in this flat, either.

As he reached out and put his hand on the knob of the door, he had an unexpected thought, but one which he voiced aloud without hesitation, because though it might be the worst idea he'd ever had in all his life, something inside him wouldn't be satisfied until he said it.

"Colin, do you have a job?"

The other's pale-blue eyes lit up with surprise at the unpremeditated inquiry.

"No," he said, slowly, as he regarded Arthur with an uncomprehending gaze. "Why?"

Arthur twisted the edge of his mouth thoughtfully, and then released the doorknob and turned back to face the peculiar boy who had saved him.

"Come by the office building tomorrow," he told him uncompromisingly. "I'll find something for you to do. Empty trash, perhaps. I'm sure you could manage that without mishap, couldn't you?"

Colin narrowed his eyes at him, but a smile was tugging on his lips as he replied.

"Oh, I don't know. I can find a mishap in just about anything."

"Great," Arthur said brightly, completely ignoring the point. "Get there first thing in the morning, then. I know my father would be happy to hire you after you saved my life…_if_ that is actually what you did, which I do still have my doubts, just so you know."

"Of course you do," Colin said as Arthur stepped out of the flat and to the top of the rickety staircase. "I'm a hero."

"You're a coward. I can tell by the way you hold yourself."

"If you say so."

"I do."

Arthur's cell phone buzzed in his pocket, the strident ringing telling him without his even having to look exactly who was calling to find out his location.

"That would be Father," he said explanatorily at Colin's raised eyebrows. "I'll see you tomorrow, then?"

"Tomorrow," Colin agreed, and held out his hand.

Arthur grasped it firmly, and when he felt the sharp, sweet twinge in his fingertips, he diagnosed it as a muscle reaction from his injuries.

Merlin watched him until he had disappeared out the door at the bottom of the staircase into the cool night air. Then, he shut the door of his flat and inhaled the trail of faint magic Arthur's spirit had left lingering, and marveled at how the whole place didn't seem so cold and lonely anymore.

_Tomorrow_, he thought, and he couldn't have wiped the grin off of his face if he'd tried.

* * *

_When he reentered his chambers after nearly two hours, he found Merlin to be half-hidden on the other side of his bed, bent over with an armful of clothes which he dropped in a tangled mess unceremoniously into a basket, despite the fineness of the material of which some of the more official things were made._

"There_ you are," Arthur exclaimed, throwing one hand in the air while the other shut the door behind him. "I've been looking everywhere for you."_

"_Didn't the thought occur to you that I'd be in here?" Merlin questioned as he lifted the basket from the floor, staggering only slightly under its weight. "Seems like I always am, after all."_

_At that, Arthur let out a sharp laugh of disbelief._

"_Merlin, if there's one place you hardly ever are, it's where you're supposed to be," he told him as he approached. "And definitely hardly ever in here."_

"_Well, you've found me now," the young manservant huffed in that way he always did when he was in a rush to finish his chores (which was always). "What did you want me to do?"_

_It was then that Arthur felt a rush of something resembling nervousness; it was not his changing his mind, for he was convinced of what he must do and had pondered it all morning until finally deciding upon a course of action. Still, he was the first to admit that such things as these rarely came naturally to him, and so he took his usual plan of attack and went into his next words dauntlessly and before he could try to come up with something better._

"_There's something I need to tell you," he said, placing one hand upon the clothesbasket as Merlin attempted to get around him. "It's important, so put this down and listen."_

_Merlin blinked at the seriousness of his master's voice, but obediently set the basket down on Arthur's dining table and held the other man's gaze._

"_Is something wrong, Arthur?"_

_The king could hear the hazarding anxiousness in Merlin's voice, and he supposed the younger man had reason to expect some terrible news from him. It had only been a week, after all, since Arthur had lifted the first law condemning magic in the land, and while most of the people of the kingdom were well accepting and even thrilled of the fact, there were still some old followers of Uther's decree who were trying to raise trouble. Arthur had faith that these people would soon come to see the light—and if not, they surely had a right to their own beliefs, and if they caused any riots or uttered blasphemy, they would be adequately punished for the wrongdoings. For Merlin's part, he had been so long dreading all the possible outcomes of his magic's revealed, so while half of him wanted to sing with the joy of it (Arthur had promptly commanded that he keep his musical energies contained, _please_, Merlin), there was still the other half which was hopelessly awaiting the downfall._

_Arthur felt better each day when that part of Merlin faded a bit more._

"_Everything is fine, Merlin," he reassured him with perhaps a bit more gentleness than he meant; it seemed that was what was becoming of him—his darling wife and dear friend were making him into a soft-soul (but he couldn't find it in him to complain). "There was just a small matter that I wanted to take care of."_

"_Okay." Merlin kept his eyes on Arthur's face and waited patiently for him to continue._

_Arthur glanced down at his right hand before he spoke, looking directly into Merlin's face._

"_You know there have been a few small groups of people throughout the kingdom who disagree with my letting sorcerers free."_

_Merlin's brows knitted together a bit, but he nodded understandingly._

"_I haven't heard of anyone causing trouble here, in the city, yet," Arthur went on, "but there is always that possibility, and most everyone is aware that you, Merlin, are the reason behind my decision."_

_Merlin's eyes softened at that and he smiled with another nod._

"_I just…" Arthur trailed off, and then began again. "Guinevere was telling me, last night, that she was concerned for you, running about the lower town and wherever else it is you constantly disappear off to, when everyone knows that you're a warlock now."_

"_Arthur," Merlin grinned lightly, "you've seen what my magic can do. I don't think you need to worry about anyone attacking me."_

"_That's what I told Guinevere," Arthur agreed quickly. "But then I was thinking about it, and I know you can protect yourself, but if you're forced to injure or even kill someone, even if it's in your own defense, that could create a problem for the both of us. And I know that you know that already, Merlin."_

_The young warlock bit his lower lip as he considered this._

"_I also know you'd let a man hurt you before you'd risk my people's loyalty to me," Arthur went on, "and that's what Guinevere said was bothering her, and in truth, me too."_

_Merlin looked up again, a shadow passing over his handsome face._

"_What do you want me to do, then, sire?"_

"_Nothing," he said, and he actually felt secretly pleased that he'd solved this problem for Merlin, instead of the other way around, as it so often seemed to be. "I've come up with a solution for it."_

_Merlin raised one eyebrow._

"_Really?"_

"_I'm perfectly capable of coming up with well-structured solutions on my own, you know," Arthur answered the sarcasm evenly, and fished the answer to their problem from his pocket._

"_Everyone in the five kingdoms knows that the dragon engraved on the outside of this it is the sign of the Pendragon house," he said as he passed the small, silver ring over to his friend. "No man in his right mind would dare challenge the king of Camelot for something that has this on it."_

"_So I'm your possession now," Merlin deadpanned, and he meant it to sound irritable and disdainful, but the wonderment in his misty gaze as he held the ring in his palm betrayed his true state of mind._

"_You've always been, Merlin," Arthur retorted with a grin some might call proud, others obnoxious, but which was actually a bit of both. "And now, all you have to do is show them this, and anyone will know it."_

_It was meant to come out as a condescending tease, but instead, it really bespoke more of the noble and sincere intentions of his heart. Only one other person had ever received such a token from Arthur, and that Merlin was valued as his friend as much as Guinevere was as his wife would certainly be clear. Once, such a thought—that someone whose opinion he valued so highly knew of his deepest affections—might have made the young king feel exposed and discomfited, but now, knowing who Merlin was and how he felt in return, he only felt secure to let the warlock know this._

"_You don't have to wear it all the time," he said with more seriousness, because he still wasn't entirely certain how his warlock might take the gesture, "just when you're outside the castle, at least until we know the people are at rest with these new laws."_

_Merlin pulled his gaze away from the fine band and met Arthur's once more._

"_Thank you," he said, quietly, eyes shining._

_Arthur nodded in return, patted Merlin's shoulder a bit too roughly, and went to change his clothes for target practice with his men, feeling almost more pleased with himself than he had the moment he'd signed away the laws damning his dearest friend._

_Late that night, Merlin put the beautiful silver ring on a sturdy chain in his own room, fighting off a mad grin as he put it around his neck and found the small weight of it wonderfully reassuring of what great things the future might hold for all of them._

_On the day he left Camelot broken and burning without its beloved king, Merlin clutched the ring so tightly in his fist that the chain broke._

* * *

Arthur was still struggling to recall the dream he'd had as he entered his private office the following morning. He remembered seeing the room, the basket of clothes Merlin had been carrying, and even recalled that his dream-self—the king—was giving Merlin a gift out of concern, but beyond that, he had no idea what the details were. This happened rarely with his dreams; most of the time he could recite every detail when he awoke (all except Merlin's appearance, of course), but there were some times when he could not remember nearly anything about it.

He frowned and opened the door of his office with the hand that wasn't holding his cheap city coffee, and when his eyes immediately went to the silver ring dangling just below a pine-colored scarf, he remembered.

For a long moment, he was lost in wondering why his mind should invent a whole dream centered only around Colin's old ring, but then he backtracked and thought, _Colin?_

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

Colin looked up from where he was reading a book he'd removed from the shelf on the right wall and smiled at him in greeting.

"You said to come early, so that's what I did," he answered matter-of-factly. "Be grateful, Arthur. I'm normally late for everything."

"How did you get in here?" he asked with mild hilarity, as he bent down to ensure that the lock of his office door hadn't been tampered with.

"It was open."

"That's impossible. We make sure the doors are locked every night."

"Well, it was open this morning."

Arthur stood and jumped the tiniest bit when Colin was suddenly right in front of him.

"What are you—a wizard?" he exclaimed before he could think about it.

Colin laughed aloud at that.

"Maybe you just need a better lock, Arthur."

The younger Gregory went around the skinny _blockade_ standing in the middle of his office and set his now-cool cup of coffee on his desk. It was then that a document addressed to Anthony Gregory caught his attention, and he swiped it up to see the contents of the letter.

"What are you reading?"

Colin's voice in his ear broke his concentration, and he rolled his eyes with a contained sigh.

"This letter should have gone to my father," he said, more to himself than to the nosy _boy_ peering over his shoulder.

"Do you want me to take it to him?"

Arthur raised an eyebrow at him.

"Are you sure you can manage it, _Col_in?"

Colin grinned and nodded with a strange eagerness and energy Arthur had only seen very rarely in toddlers. Troublesome toddlers.

"I know where his office is," he added helpfully.

"Good for you." Arthur picked up a second note, this one much curter and informal than the first. "It appears my father already asked me to come down as soon as I arrived."

"He expected that you'd be here today?" Merlin questioned, having halted halfway to the door with the first letter in hand.

"I'm always here, Colin," came Arthur's reply as he removed his jacket and toss it onto the leather chair nearby. (Merlin had a sudden memory of all the countless times he'd seen his first Arthur do the same with a worn red cloak.) "It's my job."

"Right." Merlin, despite the fact that Arthur had taken the letter from him, followed the blonde man out into the hall.

He was suddenly glad that he'd given Arthur the enchanted vial the evening previous, because the young man looked healthier today, he thought; he'd need that extra amount of strength, just as he had always needed it as a devoted king when he was pushing himself to tend to his kingdom despite any unwell he was suffering. Another warm feeling of affection rushed over the warlock; this was _his Arthur_, and he needed Merlin to take care of him.

"I'd almost forgotten how dedicated you can be."

Arthur glanced to him from where he was reading over the note left for him by his father, attempting to decipher what the short message of _"Meet me in my office as soon as you arrive"_ might mean.

"What are you talking about, Colin? I've barely known you a day."

When Colin didn't reply, Arthur didn't notice, because his own words struck something in his mind. Was it really possible that he'd only known Colin for twenty-four hours? It felt as though it had been much longer than that—years, even. The way Colin fell into step just beside him, the freedom he felt when he spoke with him, like Colin wanted to be with him and talk to him without any real reason at all except because he wanted to—it was as though it had been this way for their whole lives. But how could that be?

He stuffed his father's note into his trouser pocket and went around the corner into the older Gregory's private office, closing the door behind him and not even considering having to tell Colin to wait for him in the hall. He knew he would.

Surely enough, Merlin went and sat in the same chair he'd occupied just the afternoon before, where he could get a clear image of Anthony Gregory and his son as the elder man sat at his office and ushered Arthur inside.

* * *

Merlin, in his many years traversing over the globe, had learnt many skills which became useful to him in times when they were needed. Amongst these which were not magical, the talent of lip-reading had been one he'd picked up in the First World War, when it had been a good skill to have when he'd been sent as a spy by the British government behind enemy lines; his superiors had had no idea, of course, of who he was. To them, he was just a clever young man with many innate abilities and talents which were useful to them, and he was happy to give meaning to his life for a little while by helping them take down wicked enemies of innocent lives.

Now, though his skills had become dulled with disuse, when Anthony Gregory spoke the words _"…resigned her job here as of yesterday…"_ and _"…must find a suitable replacement…"_ Merlin knew exactly to whom he was referring.

And when Arthur immediately turned to look at him through the glass, his keen, quick eyes lit up just as they used to be when he got some grand scheme, whether of battle or otherwise, Merlin's heart skipped a beat.

He said something to his father, but Merlin could not decipher what for the angle at which he turned to face the older man, and then Anthony Gregory subsequently glanced up to him. When the senior Gregory pointed with his index finger and gestured for him, Merlin had to be sure and pointed to himself in an understood _"Me?"_

Both Anthony and Arthur rolled their eyes—one out of shrewd impatience, the other semi-fond tolerance.

When Merlin entered the office, he almost wasn't sure what to make of the peculiar, silent pleading emanating from Arthur's posture.

"State your name, please."

The way in which Anthony Gregory spoke was so much of Uther that he very nearly answered _"Merlin,"_ before he caught himself.

"Colin James," he stated instead, and, understanding what dignity was expected of him, interlinked his fingers behind his back and held himself straight and elegant as he could manage.

"Mr. James."

"Yes, sir?"

Arthur moved to stand beside him—moral support, he guessed, though Merlin wasn't sure how much good it would do in the presence of a man like Anthony Gregory.

"Do you have any experience as a personal assistant?"

He laughed outright in his mind, but kept his face straight and grave as Mr. Gregory's.

"Yes, sir, I do."

"How much experience?"

He could have answered that he had over thirty years' worth, but that may have sounded peculiar coming from the mouth of a man with the face of a twenty-one-year-old, so he settled for a small detour to the question.

"I have had a position as personal helper to a young man in the royal family, sir. I left because he died."

He felt it when Arthur's gaze fell to shock at his left, but he did not face him, keeping his eyes locked boldly upon Anthony's.

The elder Gregory regarded him coolly and aloofly for another half-moment.

"Excellent," said he finally, moving to sit behind his desk like a king upon his throne. "As per your suggestion, Arthur, Mrs. Osprey will be promoted to replace Kate, and Mr. James, you are hired as my son's personal assistant, effective immediately. You will tend to his every command and be paid sufficiently for your duties. Is that clear?"

He wasn't sure if he said a yes, or even a thank you, but when he found himself in the hallway once more, with Anthony Gregory's office behind him and Arthur beside him, he choked on what may have been an utterly startled laugh.

"_Thank you_, Colin," Arthur was saying as he walked along beside him, back toward his own office. "You have no idea what a relief it is to be rid of Mrs. Osprey's assistance; that woman is a great secretary—the _queen_ of secretaries, and I'm sure she might not be so bad otherwise, but she's a horrible old bird to try to get along with at the office."

"Yeah," he said, actually proud of how calm and actually in-character his voice sounded, "sure, no problem, Arthur."

"I'll pay you for today and I should have another guy hired by tomorrow."

It took a moment for the other man's words to seep into his mind past the surprise and irony of it all, but when it did, Merlin nearly stumbled as he let out a sharp cry.

"No!"

Arthur gave him a strange sidelong look.

"Surely you weren't being serious when you said you worked for a royal, Colin," he said, only partially joking.

Merlin gave him a hard look.

"Of course I was serious," he said, holding his hands out in his excitement.

Arthur's eyes slid down to Merlin's collar bone, where the ring was just visible beneath the fabric of the dark-haired man's pale shirt and overlying green scarf.

"Is that where you got the ring?" he asked, his voice altered just the littlest bit as he pieced together the small clues of Colin's past.

Merlin instinctively reached up and touched King Arthur's ring through his shirt, feeling its slightly dinged edges through the thin material.

"Yes," he said, barely a whisper, and then his voice grew it volume once more. "And they didn't even fire me, Arthur, if that's what you're wondering. I did leave after he died; I had no more reason for being there, not that I was bad at my duties."

"How on earth," Arthur said, and it might have been tactless, but he'd decided that wasn't such a big deal with Colin, "did someone like _you_ get hired into a royal family's household? Your clothes don't even fit you properly."

Colin seemed to look nostalgically abashed for a moment, and he grinned outright at some memory which Arthur did not know.

"It's a long story, Arthur. It was an accident, more than anything else."

His expression changed even as he said this, fell to some ancient shadow as his mind went back to a time less complex than this—to a time when he was barely older than a boy, when his magic flashed in his eyes, drawn out for the first time in his life by something greater than his own will—by his destiny, by the handsome, slumbering face of a young prince who would become The Once and Future King of Albion as he was helpless to defend himself from the wicked magic of a vengeful witch, when he had needed the warlock who would become his own for the first time in either of their existences.

"But then," said Merlin, lost in the memory, "I suppose accidents are nothing but destiny speaking."

Arthur watched and heard him now, and though he could not see or hear the remembrance playing out in the depths of Colin's imagination, there was something in his pale, ancient face and low, haunted voice which drew him in. He opened his mouth to ask what the story might be behind such a thought, and then his own voice was stolen from his throat. His vision darkened and was replaced with flashes—nothing more, just flickers of dull candles and a table of rich food and a man with an old crown circling his graying head.

…"_You saved my boy's life. A debt must be repaid."_

"_Ah, well…"_

"_Don't be so modest. You shall be rewarded."_

"_No, honestly, you don't have to, your highness."_

"_Absolutely. This merits something quite special. You shall be rewarded a position in the royal household. You shall be Prince Arthur's manservant."_

"_Father!"… _(4)

When the argumentative cry of his own voice drifted away from him, Arthur blinked to dispel the stars in his sight, his palm against his head and Colin's hand gripping his forearm supportively.

"Are you all right, Arthur?" Colin murmured gently, with no surprise in his voice, but only genuine concern.

"Yeah," he said gaspingly. "Just got…dizzy, for a moment, that's all. I'm fine, Colin."

Colin released his arm and followed him back to his office, where he sat heavily down upon his chair before ordering his new assistant to go get his schedule from Mrs. Osprey's desk. His voice was back to normal, but it was as though Colin saw something in his face which made him hesitate for just the barest moment before he obeyed.

Once Colin was gone from the room, Arthur pressed his fingers against his eyes and thought back. Yes, he realized, it was still there. Merlin's eyes. He could see Merlin's eyes now in his mind. Nothing else, just the deep, changeable, captivating green-blue of his eyes blinking innocently at him.

They were Colin's eyes.

* * *

In Mrs. Osprey's smaller office just outside of Arthur's, Merlin dug through a drawer of the desk without truly concentrating upon what he was doing. His head was spinning, his body tense and his hands trembling as they tingled with the excited magic pulsing through his veins.

Destiny had made its decision. Probably it had made it even before it had ever whispered of The Once and Future King and Emrys into the ears of devout priests of the Old Religion. It had replaced him where he was always meant to be.

He was at Arthur's side again.

**To be continued  
(in Part iii)**

* * *

(1) The Nightmare Begins (Episode 3, Season 2), beginning at 06:17.

(2) The Curse of Cornelius Sigan (Episode 1, Season 2), at 04:13.

(3) Slightly out-of-the-way reference to Valiant (Episode 2, Season 1), beginning at 32:13.

(4) The Dragon's Call (Episode 1, Season 1), at 40:43.

* * *

_Thanks so much for reading (if you've lasted this long)! Part iii will involve more of Morgana versus Merlin, evil and good magic spells, hurt/comfort, and the like, so don't forget me—I'll be back with more next Friday!  
Songs for this part:  
Everything by Lifehouse  
A Thousand Years by Christina Perri  
Your Guardian Angel by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus  
Also, I have one, quick question for anyone who might know. What is 62 American dollars converted to British pounds? This does actually have to do with this fic, just so you don't think I'm random or anything like that. (I just hate research.)  
Remember: T__here's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it. ;)_


	3. Part iii

_So this part shows Arthur and Merlin's relationship growing a bit. It features Morgana (but not too prominently, yet) and basically revolves around Merlin and Arthur protecting each other, how that makes their friendship change for the better, and how Arthur is confused about his increasingly strange memories and dreams. Also, there's banter. Enjoy!_

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Part iii**

_As Merlin's indigo cloak was swallowed up by the glinting of armor and blades, the rich purple seeming so unfit in the blood-splattered battle, a flicker crossed Arthur's mind of a dream long-sealed—of himself, and Guinevere, and Merlin, of a little farm somewhere on a hillside, between a quaint country village and a darkly forbidden forest, where they would live in peace except for when they decided they wanted a taste of adventure. Guinevere would sing softly to their child—a girl, with his eyes and her hair, and Merlin would use his magic to make the smoke in the fireplace dance. They would playfully urge Arthur to take a turn making supper (because of course Merlin would cook most of the meals), and when he burnt it beyond salvation, Guinevere and his little daughter would laugh and hug him, and Merlin would give him a look and call him a dollophead and conjure a beautiful supper it its place._

_It had been years since he'd allowed himself to think of that fantasy which would never come true. So many things had pushed into the way of it, had buried it so deeply that he was certain even that little fragment of him would be gone forever._

_It was not, however, and he wondered if that Arthur, the one who dragged Merlin into the cursed forest whenever a noble quest arose and returned home to a simple cottage made of timber, was happy at that moment. It may have been a wild and insane thought, but he hoped that he was, even if he didn't exist but within his own imagination._

_He closed his eyes only for a moment once he realized that Merlin was gone, far off toward the looming tower which stood over a wicked city; he sent up a prayer for the gods to keep safe all of his friends and loved ones, took a quick breath into his lungs, and then, he returned to the war._

_It felt like hours that it never stopped—in fact, it may have been, but the blurs of colors and echoes of screams seemed to erase time altogether. He could vaguely comprehend the sky above, how the dark clouds slowly began to make their way westward until they swirled in a black congregation around the witch's tower on the hill._

_He wondered, as he blocked another sword from gouging into his lung, what sort of war waged inside the walls of that place. It had been said that Emrys and Morgana were to be each other's destinies, and he would be her doom. Arthur wondered if that would at last be true, in whatever confrontation the two of them faced in each other now. Merlin was the greatest warlock in past and future, the Druids had told him long ago, and so he tried to recall the power of his friend's magic against hers to settle the trepidation in his mind._

_He sent up another prayer in his heart. If Merlin could complete this last exploit, perhaps they would finally have the chance to be free of the war._

_Arthur cut down his adversary with a swipe of his glorious Excalibur; in the same moment, a crash of thunder rolled over the valley. He turned to face its origin, to see what the suddenly red glow of the dark clouds roiling about the tower might possibly mean, and then he found himself face-to-face with his own destiny._

_Mordred stood beneath the swirling sky like an ever-tranquil statue before him, almost smiling, but never quite._

* * *

"Rise and shine!"

For the first time since it had begun, Arthur was grateful for the infinitely annoying shout which tore into his dream, because it served to conceal the jolt which went through his entire body at the sight of Mordred's piercing eyes.

He groaned, loudly, and that wasn't just to keep up appearances.

"Colin," he said, half-muffled by the soft pillow which felt three times softer than when he'd fallen asleep the night before, "can't you come up with anything more original to blare out first thing in the morning?"

"You won't like any of my other choices either, sir," came the sure answer, entirely too jovial for six forty-five on a Friday morning.

"How did you even get in here?" he demanded halfheartedly, just like he did almost every morning, as he rubbed at his eyes and pushed himself to sit.

There was a little jingling sound, and he opened his weary eyes to see his ridiculously energetic assistant waving a key ring in one hand as he scrambled to collect various papers from around the room.

"You gave me a key, remember?" he said patiently. "Something about how it made you feel better to know I was using one to get into your flat instead of breaking in every morning. I told you honestly, though, I wasn't breaking in to start with. You just need—"

"—a better lock. Yes, I'm aware. Thank you so much, Colin."

As he continued to rub the sleep from his face, Colin smiled at him where he could not see and moved to gather some clothes from the walk-in closet in the corner of the room.

"Did you sleep well, sir?" he called as the faint noise of metal hangers sliding emanated from the place.

"I'd like to be sleeping right now," he retorted sharply, and he hoped against hope that his new assistant might not notice that he hadn't actually answered the question.

Naturally, however, Colin James scarcely missed anything.

"I take it that's a no, then," said the dark-haired boy wisely as he emerged with a black suit draped over one arm.

"Just a nightmare," Arthur said flippantly, having caught sight of Colin's particular choice of attire for him for the day. "What's that for?"

Colin's brows furrowed, one side of his mouth quirking as he debated whether he should press about the dream or let it go for his boss' sake…and of course, he decided upon the latter.

"You are scheduled to give a lecture today," he told his friend as he laid the suit neatly across the bottom of the bed, scarlet-red tie and all, and the way he said it might have made one believe that lecture-giving was the privilege and highlight of one Arthur Gregory's whole day.

Arthur, even after only little less than a month of having Colin James in his employment, had learnt in the first week that when the young assistant sounded _that_ cheerful, it was usually because he was trying to use extravagant cheer to keep Arthur from getting grumpy at some undesired responsibility he was facing, or because he thought it was funny to mess with his acerbic boss, or both. The young Gregory groaned and fell back against his soft pillows.

"None of that, Arthur," said Colin's voice sternly as he pulled the blankets over his head with stubbornness.

He'd no more relaxed into the mattress again than the covers were thrown back so that he couldn't even reach them with his feet.

He wondered why he'd bothered to replace Mrs. Osprey. Colin was ten times worse.

"We've got to hurry or we're going to be late," continued the brisk tone as the energetic boy rushed into his closet to grab his shoes. "I was already delayed by an accident getting here."

That sprung a thought to Arthur's mind which served to awaken him more than his assistant's constant pestering.

"That reminds me," he said as he pulled himself up, "there's something I need to discuss with you, over breakfast."

Colin swiped something up from where he'd set it on Arthur's bookshelf beside one of his fencing trophies.

"Better make it lunch, sir," he advised, and proceeded to hit his young boss square in the chest with a fast-food biscuit wrapped in greasy paper.

Arthur opened his mouth to protest several things about this, but Colin was already out the bedroom door, calling over his shoulder,

"I'm making hazelnut coffee! Hurry or it'll be cold!"

Arthur wondered if it was possible to hate the best secretary he'd ever had.

"_Arthur_! Are you still sitting in bed?"

He growled under his breath but got up just so he could have the satisfaction of replying,

"No, _Col_in!"

* * *

Merlin kept his eyes fixed intently upon the road ahead as they sped through the up-class London morning. Three times in the past month Morgana had attempted to create an accident which would put Arthur's life at risk, and three times Merlin had barely seen it in time to stop it.

Last night had been the closest yet. In the dark, he had almost not seen the chains snap off of the metal ladder on the repair truck in front of them. He shuddered as he imagined the sharp ends of it stabbing into Arthur's young heart through the windshield and killing him before Merlin could whisper words that would heal the wounds.

"Are you cold, Col?"

He pulled his eyes away to steal a glance at the man beside him, and offered him a reassuring smile at the little nickname. He couldn't recall ever being called by a nickname.

"No. I'm fine, sir."

Arthur turned the air conditioner to a lower setting anyway and refocused his attention upon the road, one hand settled upon the center of the steering wheel and one lying on the gearshift of the BMW. With both windows rolled down only an inch, the blonde of his hair fluctuated with the whipping wind in the early rays of the sun, and when they took a corner and the light came from straight ahead instead of at an angle, the deep blues of his eyes seemed to catch on fire.

Merlin would never say it aloud, but Arthur was beautiful.

He looked down at the old camera—that is, the camera which was made to look old but was actually digital in use—sitting in his lap, and wondered if he could risk snapping a picture. He eventually decided against it; he knew his little hobby of photography was beginning to annoy Arthur at times, but after all, it was Arthur's own fault. He shouldn't have ever given the camera to him as a gift if he didn't want Colin using it at his liberty.

He felt himself smile as he recalled the day, two weeks into his new job as P.A., when he had entered Arthur's office to do some filing and found the camera sitting on the desk with his name (his _pseudonym_) on a piece of paper beside it, along with the words, _"Take it. I never use it anyway."_

He'd laughed, because he'd never known Arthur had even been paying attention when he was going on about what I nice thing it was, and how it reminded him of the Diana cameras used by the fashionable American reporters from the forties and fifties. Dianas were the cameras he had always wanted to have, but had never purchased because he'd had nothing to photograph—and what things he _did_ were far too secret and sad.

(For the past thousand years even until he present, Merlin kept a close track upon certain magical artifacts of his knowledge, stealing them away from dangerous hands and subsequently stopping many a tragedy that remained unknown to the world. He had moved a certain one of these artifacts to a secret locale in Europe after travelling after it to America during the Great Depression and stopping its delivery to an upcoming mobster in Cincinnati; this was how he'd come to live for a dozen years in the Ohio city before moving on. Unfortunately, his efforts rebounded when a certain boy called Adolf Hitler stumbled across its hiding place in Austria, and his damning obsession with the "occult" grew from it…but that was a long story he might tell someday, for now he had someone who might be able to listen.)

Now, the memory card of Arthur's-now-his camera was nearly full with pictures of everything—of the city, the stars, Arthur. There were many of Arthur in various settings—galas, the office, the shop when he could drag him out to help him buy some food to make, making a face at Colin beside a jar of his favorite peanut butter. He would not lose him so completely, ever again. If it was the will of the gods that he live one more life with him on the earth, then he would be with him again when he died, and he would carry his memories in the camera so that his mind would never forget them.

"Here we are," Arthur's unenthusiastic announcement broke through his contemplations, and he looked up to find that they were pulling to a stop in front of Camelot Bank.

It was the largest of all Camelot Banks, Arthur had said, and Merlin could believe it. He had never entered its doors himself (having little use for banks), but he'd passed it multiple times since its founding in the early part of the twentieth century.

As he stepped out onto the sidewalk, tossing his cloth satchel over his shoulder and replacing his daily planner into it at his side, he looked up at the grand columns and white arches of the place and thought of how peculiar it was that the descendants of the Pendragon family were there, with him in London all those decades ago and he had never known it. How many times, he wondered, had he passed this very street and perhaps walked right by Arthur's Z4 or one of his father's BMWs in the past seven years? He had never known that all he had to do was wait just a minute or two longer, to stop the overwhelming and depressing cycle of his life for just a moment, and he would have seen Arthur exit the place.

It mattered little now—and anyway, it made him feel rather pathetic to think about it—so Merlin closed the car door behind himself and sprinted up the wide stone staircase to catch up to his friend, ignoring the way his camera hit the sensitive place on his chest between his lungs as he did.

Arthur began to speak, explaining something about his family's legacy, how they had gone from weapons traders to adding banking to their skills almost overnight, and how some Gregorys still built weapons by hand in the further parts of Britain, and the meanings and histories behind the building. Merlin listened closely and never told him that he needn't bother detailing the history, because he had lived it as it'd happened. Instead, he just smiled at him and kept up with his quick pace easily as they passed several people making their way into the doors.

Call it paranoia, but Merlin always made certain he was within arm's breadth of Arthur when they entered a building.

* * *

He was starting to get good at this modern administrative assisting thing, Merlin thought, as he scribbled down another quick note from the lecture Arthur was giving. The young man hadn't even gone over what he would say; he just knew it by heart, the same way he'd known how to address his council members in court, the way his father had taught him. It was only further evidence that Anthony Gregory was, in some part, a type of Uther.

He looked across the table, to the sharply-dressed people, all keen eyes and thick wallets, attending the small assembly. They were born to play this role, he thought—to be money-making, vodka-drinking millionaires. Arthur, no matter how much he might look the charming and arrogant banker's son, was not made like them. After all, he thought, just look at the assistant he'd chosen. Where prim female assistants with ponytails and sex appeal sat alongside each man (and one young male assistant from Italy with the semi-elderly woman banker), Arthur had Colin James—skinny, scarf-adorned, simple-hearted Colin James from the countryside.

All of them together would never equal the grace and humanity Arthur Gregory possessed, of that Merlin was certain.

Watching his friend address them with the assertiveness and strength of character that was unique to his leadership, Merlin cared little for what funny looks he'd received from the expensive P.A.s when he had entered at Arthur's heels. All that mattered was that he was _here_, listening and helping and protecting with all he had.

Just as it was meant to be.

Well into the hour, Merlin's mind began to wander, and so he allowed it, for he had heard Arthur give him this lecture countless times—how to save and secure your money wisely—to him, especially, when they were driving down the road or taking a train. He guessed it was because Arthur thought him a pitifully poor man, and he was trying his best to help without being pushy or conspicuous. He laughed when this occurred, and Arthur retaliated by insisting that he listen, because the Gregorys were excellent with their money and he should count himself lucky to be getting advice from one, but then he distracted the man with some witty remark and they were back to bickering and far from any sort of serious conversation.

It was wonderful, just to sit and do nothing but talk and laugh for twenty or more minutes at a time.

He remembered a time when Arthur, a fresh and spirited young king, had looked just as he did today, with the exception that he had been standing with his golden crown upon his head; still, even without a crown to declare him, the positive energy in Arthur's countenance was the same as an assertive king. This was a new start for them both, he imagined, despite whatever Morgana had planned.

When the meeting ended, and the people cleared the room, Merlin put his pen into the spine of his notebook and dropped both into his bag.

In the private lift, Arthur began to talk about all the men and women who had been in the assembly, about each of their backgrounds and about why some of them he liked more than others, and Merlin just smiled, and listened, and never once interrupted the sound of his king's voice talking aimlessly, or the way his hands gestured in the air like every word was a regal decree.

When they reached the lower level, back where the sun shone in through the high windows and reflected off the brass chandelier high above the polished floor, Arthur tugged on his assistant's bony elbow and urged him toward a different direction than the way they'd come.

"Where are we going?" Merlin asked curiously, as they entered a narrow, carpeted hall which looked as though it had been carpeted in the fifties or sixties; unlike the main lobby, it was completely empty.

"There's one more thing we have to do before we leave," the other man replied in explanation, as he led his assistant to a plain wooden door at the end. "There are old files my father asked me to start sorting through weeks ago; I've been putting it off, but now that I've got you…."

"Of course, my lord. Whatever I can do to lighten the heavy burdens you bear."

Arthur, who rolled his eyes at his young secretary's melodrama and commented in a mumble about how he _"…should have been an actor, the daffodil…,"_ would never suspect that Merlin meant every word.

A minute later, the warlock was coughing breathlessly at the whiff of dust stirred directly into his face.

"How old are these files?" his voice strained out as he set down his satchel in an old leather chair which was torn in three places and covered in its own layer of pale dust.

"That's the problem," Arthur told him, rather cheerily, as they were not his responsibility alone as long as he had Colin to do them for him at command. "All the files in every cabinet in this old office are all mixed up, and it's our job to sort them all out by date…well, actually—"

Merlin looked up from the old folder (which spun dust with every slight movement, almost like it was conjuring it) and into his employer's face, hoping in the view of the seven filing cabinets that Arthur had misquoted Anthony's instructions.

"—_your _job," was all he got for his hopes.

"Great." He set the folder aside, carefully, but still fought off a sneeze. "Thanks."

Arthur grinned at him—a quirky, devious, playful grin, and Merlin was thrown by it momentarily, because it was the first time he'd seen that particular grin in a thousand years. It was the same he'd seen for the very first time during the first banquet he'd ever attended in Camelot, when the spirited and mischievous prince had thought it so amusing to dress his poor, naïve serving-boy in the "official ceremonial robes of the servants of Camelot," and Merlin had blushed all evening as the regal guests had eyed his presumptuous feathered hat. The last time he'd seen that familiar grin was the night before the final battle, because Arthur, no matter what darkness had come upon him in his many eminent years as king, never really changed from that spirited prince at heart.

Whatever insolent response he'd been thinking died on his lips at the blessedly familiar sight of that silly grin.

"I'm going to go get a few things done at the office," Arthur continued, maneuvering between his assistant and a looming metal cabinet and making his escape toward the door. "I'll be back in a couple of hours. Have fun, Col."

Merlin rolled his eyes and sighed disgruntledly, but once Arthur had fled with a teasing sparkle in his eyes and the door closed to block all but a tiny sliver of light from the hall, the warlock's own eyes flashed golden and the ends of his hair flitted just slightly in a new breeze. Soft light emanated from an untraceable source, reflecting from the tiny flecks of dust which suddenly swirled altogether and upward like a tiny, harmless tornado controlled by the flitting of Merlin's hand.

The swirling moved across the room, picking up strays of itself as it went, and finally landed in a small pile in the far corner. Merlin half-smiled as his imagination molded the dust into a tiny collection of figures no bigger than salt shakers and hardened them into heavy statuettes. A set of tiny creatures—a unicorn, a griffon, and a dragon—stood up from the dust as though made of solid rock. Merlin's smile broadened. Courage, strength, and magic. Beings of legend.

He wondered, idly, as he started to use his magic to file through each document in his mind at inhuman speed, if Gwaine ever had remembered that day on the bridge in the kingdom of the Fisher King, when the little man had seen them all three for who they were within.

* * *

By the time Arthur returned, half of the filing had been done—not all, because he couldn't wonder _too_ much how Colin was so unbelievably and, by his credulous opinion, unrealistically efficient.

"You got all of this done in two hours," was his first flat comment, as he looked around the place at the clean surfaces and neat drawers of the first three-and-a-half cabinets.

"Yes. I'm not an idiot."

Arthur raised an eyebrow at him, but it seemed that whatever stored insults he had were lost in the small marvel at which he was looking.

Merlin did not try to hide his self-satisfied posture as his boss inspected the room and could find no error.

"Those are things I didn't know what to do with," he explained helpfully when Arthur stopped at the desk chair (now salvaged from the three tears in its leather) and saw the small pile of documents stacked neatly in its seat.

Merlin stepped forward to the other side of the chair.

"Sir, who is this?" he asked curiously, picking up an old, thin scrapbook and passing it to his friend.

Arthur took it and flipped through the first few pages. Merlin watched his face as he took in the old newspaper clippings documenting the story of one Mordecai Shultz and his long-running scandal.

"My father's original business manager," the younger Gregory answered, turning another page and observing the photographs with interest. "He was caught stealing from Father's political funds; I don't know too much about him, but apparently he was guilty of several other crimes across the country, including first-degree murder, they said. He tried to kill my father after he discovered what he was doing and faced him with it. That was before I was born, though."

"Wow," Merlin said in quiet wonder as he took the book back from Arthur. "I'm glad he didn't succeed. You wouldn't have been born."

Arthur bit his lower lip in that way he always did when he was thinking and shook his head.

"I suppose not," he said agreeably. "He was a madman, though. From what I've learnt of him, he shouted and swore as he was being dragged from the courtroom, vowing that he'd kill my father for destroying his life. He died in a prison sanatorium a few years later, though."

"Did he have a family?" Merlin asked, as he looked through the old pictures and clippings and saw the cold and bitter blue eyes of Mordecai Shultz.

"Yes, two sons and a daughter. They lived in poverty after he lost everything though. I think my father mentioned that their mother committed suicide. None of them had any kids except the youngest son; after his wife left him, he took his own life and the baby was put up for adoption."

Merlin felt his eyes soften as he thought of an innocent life exposed to such horrors.

"That's awful," he said compassionately.

Arthur smiled just a little in unspoken fondness for his sensitive and ever-caring assistant.

"Yeah," he agreed wholeheartedly, and then took the book from Colin's hands and laid it aside on the desk. "Come on; it's time to go. I'd like to stop at the café on the way back to the office."

"All right," Merlin nodded agreeably.

"And since you're doing such a _good job_," Arthur went on, speaking in a voice so enriched with partially falsified flattery that he could have easily been talking to a well-behaved child (and of course, that was the point), "I'll even buy you a chocolate coffee."

Merlin, in true good nature, took the jesting with a quirky smile and a glance to his boss. Arthur still didn't understand how in _God's name_ Colin had never tried chocolate until three weeks before; he couldn't know that Merlin had seen it when it first begun to grow popular and widely-made, and had thought it a truly disgusting color and vowed never to taste it as long as he lived.

When Arthur had urged him to try a sip of Gemma's chocolate coffee at "the café," which was a bakery-and-restaurant combination on a quiet corner of London where Arthur frequented in peace, Merlin had renounced that vow in the catalyst of Arthur's anxious, alighted eyes.

When he'd ended the luncheon by asking for a third cup and wanting to know if they could stop on the way back to the office and buy a Hershey's for him to try, Arthur had laughed heartily and told him he would get fat if he didn't stop.

Arthur was smiling now, evidently pleased that he was going to get to eat at his favorite place, and he led Colin out toward the darker end of the hall instead of back toward the lobby.

"I like to go this way," Arthur said. "I know how much you like plants, and there's a beautiful garden on this side of the building which should be in full-bloom right about now."

Merlin couldn't help but smile fondly behind his boss's back; Arthur was so much the same—so mighty and focused, reliable to stay strong and sure beyond his years, but secretly insecure at times, only desiring to see others happy and willing to do whatever he could to make that a reality. He wondered, for a split moment, what Arthur would do if he ever discovered how broken Merlin had been before he found him again. He wondered what the man would say and do if he found out the truth about his new friend's haunted and lonely past.

Merlin wondered if he'd get a hug out of it, and felt his mouth curve into a smile at the thought.

His smile disappeared, however, when the two of them exited through a rust-stained side door of the building, and he could just catch a glimpse of a thick willow tree inside an iron fence at the end of the alley before rough hands grabbed him and yanked him back. He scarcely uttered a sound and a hand was over his mouth and around his waist.

Arthur turned at his tiny cry where he'd been a mere step ahead, but froze, blue eyes blown wide, as he saw the trembling gun barrel pressed solidly against the temple of his little assistant. He dared not take another step forward, for it was obvious that the young man who held the weapon was unsure of himself, one eye half-shut and blackened and sweat beaded on his brow as he dispatched an order in a shaking, sliding voice.

"Give me your wallet."

Arthur looked at Colin, and if he was considering it at the moment, he would have thought that it was rather strange that the boy didn't seem frightened at all to have a loaded gun thrust upon him in an alley by a young man obviously high on drugs and unsound in mind.

As it was, however, all Arthur could consider was how Colin had a loaded gun thrust upon him.

"Let him go," he countered the man's demand, almost frightening himself with the lowness and jurisdiction of his voice, and he could not stop a faint thought from leaping out in his mind.

_This is my voice in the dreams_.

Arthur's response to him seemed only to make the young man shakier, and the finger pressed lightly against the trigger of the gun began to quiver, making Arthur's heart stutter.

"I said, give me your wallet. _Now_. Or I-I'll shoot him in the head."

He shook Colin bodily for emphasis, and if Arthur thought he saw his friend roll his pale eyes at his captor, he dispelled the notion as ridiculous.

"I want you to think carefully about what you're doing," Arthur said, echoing, though he may not even have realized it, Uther's words from a dream three nights previous, when a cruel man called Aridian held a blade against Morgana's throat after Merlin had shown him for who he was. "Hurt that boy, and you'll never get out of this alive."

And, he realized after he'd said it, he meant it.

While the young homeless was held afraid by burning-blue eyes, Merlin took the chance and pushed his (disgusting) fingers away from his lips.

"Arthur," he started to say, calmly, but apparently the disillusioned addict was aware enough of himself, and half-shoved his dirty fingers back over Merlin's mouth.

"Shut up," he hissed into his ear, angrily tightening his hold around Merlin's torso, and then he turned his glassy-eyed focus back upon Arthur. "Give me your wallet!"

Arthur looked into Colin's eyes once more, and though his young friend was incredibly good at hiding what fear he must be feeling, the man could not bear to imagine letting any harm come to someone like Colin James. His pure goodness and innocent hope was like a light in Arthur's life he'd never before realized he needed. To let anybody hurt him would make Arthur just as much a murderer.

With that in mind, he reached slowly into his pocket and removed his leather wallet, the same one Colin had searched through upon their first meeting. He wished for a moment that he'd taken Colin's advice and removed the paper containing his social security number.

"Here," he said, and tossed it upon the cold cement ground between them. "Take it. Release my friend."

Apparently, however thick the wallet was, was not enough to satisfy their attacker once he understood what power he had over this obviously wealthy young man, and so he looked up from his prize and repositioned the weapon against Colin's head.

"Your cell phone too," he added with more confidence than before (though even that was scant).

Arthur felt his breath catch just the tiniest bit in his chest as panic rose and was pushed away by his natural courage.

"I haven't got one on me," he said truthfully, and prayed that he would believe him.

"Don't lie to me!" shouted so loudly that someone—anyone—should have been alerted, but of course, there was no one near enough.

"I am not lying to you," Arthur said, and though his voice remained steady, he was growing significantly more nervous now, because it was obvious that whatever this man wanted, he would not be satisfied until he had it. "It was dead, and I gave it to Colin to charge it. I _do not_ have it."

The abductor glanced to his victim at Arthur's gesture.

"Give me the cell phone."

Merlin held his body rigid as he was shaken roughly once more, but he refused to comply. Of all he had faced in his life, he would not bow to an afflicted addict, not now; if one bullet could kill him, he would have been dead at least thrice in every major war in the past three hundred years. He would not be submissive to someone so pathetic, not when Arthur looked so absolutely frightened and helpless so close to him. Every piece of his spirit compelled him to protect his king first.

He met Arthur's eyes, and Arthur looked twice as afraid when he suddenly recognized what Colin was thinking. He shook his head, once, authoritatively.

"I said," the man went on, oblivious, screaming, "_give me the phone!_"

At that second, Merlin twisted out of his grasp, barely hearing Arthur's horrified cry of _"Colin, no!"_ and the bullet whisked by Merlin's hair and indented itself into a metal garbage bin.

Merlin wasted not a moment, despite the ringing in his ears from the gunshot; with the aid of his magic (in all the commotion, neither mortal man would notice his flashing-gold eyes), he shoved the adversary's shoulder back so that he went tumbling indelicately to the ground.

Arthur, whose reflexes were truly extraordinary, grasped up the fallen weapon with lightning speed and held it steady.

"Do not move."

The man didn't.

Merlin exhaled and bent with his hands on his knees, not because of strain or stress, but because the reality of what had just occurred struck him with full force. It was nothing like any of their heroic quests of the past, it was true, with no immortal army or screaming spirits to defeat, but here, for the first time in a thousand and five hundred years, he and Arthur had overcome an adversary. Together. They had done this together—the king and the warlock. _Together_.

He laughed softly with happiness, and even the cruel look he was receiving from said king did little to dampen his spirits at such a thrill.

"What _the hell_ is wrong with you?"

He stood up straight.

"Did you have any idea what you were doing?" Arthur riled on, the hand holding the gun never moving while his powerful voice rose and his handsome face grew angrier. "You could have been killed, Colin!"

"I wasn't," he said simply, almost like a teenager to a chastising parent (and that only made him want to laugh again). "I'm not."

_Not ever_, he wanted to add, but didn't.

Arthur seemed to be biting his tongue—literally, keeping himself from saying something either heated or impulsive, or both.

"Go get the police," he commanded authoritatively, like a king to his most trusted advisor, as he kept himself composed. "We'll discuss this later, _Col_in."

Merlin knew the look on his face matched exactly what he was thinking. He was confused, in that peculiar way Arthur had always confused him. He wondered why—what would the man have to be so upset about? He had saved his money, and perhaps, _probably_, his life as well. And yet he felt as though he'd done something wrong, despite all his priding himself upon what he'd done. Nothing had changed, it seemed; there was _just no pleasing_ his majesty.

Then, halfway into the street, Merlin paused and remembered.

It had been so long since he'd thought of it. He remembered the first time he'd realized the truth, how it had hit him one day—that all of Arthur's curt remarks and shouting whenever he did something which should have been labeled as "heroic" weren't as incomprehensibly confusing and unfair as he'd always complained to Gaius they were. Arthur had never been angry at all when he'd told Merlin how big of an idiot he was. He'd been worried. He had _cared_.

Here, a thousand years later, Merlin had been living his life—or, as he preferred, his existence—as an immortal, deathless and inhuman, for so very, very long. He'd been alone, and it had altered him without his even realizing it. He'd forgotten was it was like to be afraid, to become sick and wounded and concerned for anything. He'd forgotten what it was like to have someone _care_, someone who didn't know that his name meant that Death could never claim him.

He'd forgotten what it was like to be _human_, and Arthur was reminding him. He was reminding him with every moment he spent with him that Merlin may be the greatest immortal warlock ever, but he was still not too far gone from his humanity that he could not be pulled back by a young friend with sparkling blue eyes and a protective spirit.

All at once, Merlin loved him even more than he ever had before.

* * *

"Mr. Gregory, will you tell us what happened here today?"

"Mr. Gregory, did the man being arrested try to murder you?"

"Mr. Gregory, over here!"

"Mr. Gregory!"

Arthur leaned his shoulder against Merlin's where the two of them were standing on the street corner, protected (partially) by the police who were controlling the crowd which had gathered at the scene in the twenty minutes since the gun had gone off and alerted passers-by of the situation.

"This is exactly why I didn't want anyone to know about the plane crash," he muttered with his hand in front of his mouth. "They go completely bonkers. Just look at them."

Merlin did, and couldn't help but smirk at exactly how foolish most of the people looked waving their cameras and pens in the air like playful monkeys in vain hopes of getting his boss' attention—and most of them weren't even reporters, just pedestrians who recognized the handsome young celebrity.

"Did you say _plane crash_?"

The warlock stifled a laugh. Another thing that really hadn't changed—Arthur's poor timing getting him into trouble.

"Ah…"

The young woman—just Arthur's luck, an _actual _reporter—looked at him with one trimmed eyebrow raised and both manicured hands on her hips.

"Would you mind elaborating on that, Mr. Gregory?" she asked as though she couldn't tell he obviously didn't want to discuss it, and Arthur deflated with a heavy sigh.

"Well, I would be happy to, but..." His eyes darted around, settling on the first plan he could formulate. "Colin here—"

Merlin's entertained grin dropped as he knew immediately where this was going.

"—he's my personal assistant, you see. He was there and, incidentally, the only one conscious for the whole thing. He's also a wonderful storyteller. Ask him."

"Mm-hm." She scribbled in her tiny notebook. "I see. And what happened to your_ other_ personal assistant, may I ask?"

But Arthur was already gone from hearing distance, rushed off to watch in mock interest as a policeman read the law out to the man who had attacked them.

Merlin inhaled and vowed to wake him up at least fifteen minutes earlier the next morning, just so he wouldn't think he could get away with this sort of thing.

The woman was watching him through inquiring green eyes.

"Well, it happened this way, ma'am," he began, and so distracted was he that he almost didn't feel it when a dark incantation was released into the atmosphere where they stood.

He froze mid-sentence, his eyes coming up to look of their own accord to the corner of the ambulance which had (needlessly) arrived along with the police. Half-hidden behind the vehicle, Morgana's forever cold eyes watched him like a dare while her black magic floated like a ribbon of invisible smoke.

The irritating reporter suddenly forgotten, Merlin turned his head and followed the bittersweet scent of the magic with his eyes.

He did not hear Pamela call him for the third time to answer her question, or see Morgana slip away to watch from a distance, for he was running and throwing his own invisible magic out to stop hers.

Just at the start of the alley, the policeman stood in front of the young addict with Arthur at his side; the heir was glancing down at his watch in wondering what time he would get back to the office and if he and Colin would still have the time to get a coffee from Gemma's after all, innocent of knowing how close his ancient half-sister's hatred was to him.

The weak-willed felon had his head bent and looked as though he would either faint or weep as a second officer held his cuffed wrists. As soon as he caught scent of the overpowering magic, however, his entire form changed like an unforeseeable onslaught of rain and thunder.

Merlin pushed his own magic out farther, but it was futile; Morgana's had already polluted the boy's crumbled will, and the precious seconds the warlock had to reach it were too little.

Both officers were shocked to silence as the handcuffs binding their inconsequential prisoner snapped as though they were but a child's toy. The first had barely the time to blink before his firearm was gone from its holster.

Arthur, for all his quickness of thinking, would never have the time to dive out of the way as the trigger was pulled and the bullet was fired, the sound of it all Merlin could hear.

He hurled his magic again, for the first time in years shouting out the incantation and caring little who heard or saw. The bullet curved mid-flight in direct obedience.

The instant the gun had been fired, the young man lost his reason once more and collapsed upon the sidewalk with three policemen holding him down.

Arthur's agonized cry tore through Merlin's soul as he fell to his knees upon the hard cement with his arm against his chest. In the same moment, Merlin fell before him, and he shoved Arthur's hands away and pressed his own pale and slender one over the place where dark blood-_Arthur's blood_—was just beginning to stain his white shirt.

"_Hweorfan."_

The pain disfiguring Arthur's handsome face was united with disorientation and astonishment. Through his blurring sight, he saw it...He was sure he did….Colin's eyes….they were golden…glowing like fire…

…_like magic_…

Then, his vision was spinning, colors all marring together for a single moment before breaking apart again, and there was no pain at all.

As figures began scattering in alarm in his peripheral vision, he looked to his shirt. Where there should have been blood flowing, there was nothing but pristine white fabric, without even a wrinkle, much less a damning rip from a bullet.

Unable to think clearly, Arthur raised his head once more and looked directly into Colin's eyes.

Tiny flecks of gold seemed to be just vanishing into the ring of light blue, but that could not have been so; _it was impossible_, and so he swallowed and ignored it.

"Colin," he gasped out, the sound of the gun still clanging in his head, "what…?"

Colin was gripping his arm with one hand and his shoulder with the other, tightly enough to leave bruises in the shapes of his long fingers.

Another heartbeat, and then the smell of Colin's earthen shampoo was filling his senses, slender arms wrapping around him as though his little assistant were protecting him from the world running around in madness in the street.

"Am I dying?" he murmured against Colin's shoulder, afraid to move his hands away from his chest in case there was bleeding there that he couldn't feel for shock.

All his fears were dispelled, however, as Colin chuckled softly in his ear, his breath cool as it brushed against Arthur's blonde hair. He pulled back, and it was only then that Arthur realized he hadn't minded that Colin had embraced him without his consent; his years of living with an emotionally-challenged father and no woman's influence had hardened him to most forms of affection that were not purely natural, and yet Colin's touch was almost…comforting, like a young brother's might be.

He could not deny that his secretary's elegant fingers against Arthur's shoulder and arm were serving to keep him calm even while he remained dizzy and somewhat nauseous.

"No," the man said gently in answer to his boss' soft inquiry, as he smiled at him with something like tenderness in his eyes. "You're okay, sir."

"I was…" he trailed off, glancing down once more and seeing no blood, and wondering if he might sound mad when he continued. "I was shot…wasn't I?"

Colin's forehead pinched up a bit as he pushed Arthur's jacket aside and took a long look at his crisply-clean shirt.

"It doesn't look that way, sir," he concluded after a careful inspection.

Arthur felt a familiar flare of annoyance at that; he could see _that_ for himself, thanks so much, Col.

"I felt it," was all he could manage to say, however, and instead of annoyed, he just sounded unsure.

He definitely didn't like it when Colin looked at him with compassion in his gaze, though, and released his forearm, holding out his hand out in offering to help him stand.

"I'm fine," he snapped out then, and pushed himself to his feet just as the EMTs rushed toward him with a stretcher.

"Not again," he wailed quietly, and there must have been something about the way he'd said it, because Colin somehow sent them all away without a single word.

He never knew it when, in the taxi they'd managed to procure before the reporters attacked in another frenzy, his friend reached into his own jacket pocket and fingered the sleek steel bullet which he'd caught in his palm as it had reversed its path into Arthur's heart.

* * *

Anthony Gregory barely even blinked when his son and Colin relayed the tale to him in Arthur's flat fifty minutes later. (When Merlin had called him from the apartment's landline, he'd not even had the chance to add that Arthur was fine before Anthony was barking out orders to Mrs. Osprey to have the car brought around, despite the esteemed luncheon he was in the midst of attending.)

Merlin watched the man closely but not obviously from Arthur's most comfortable living-room chair as the man clenched his jaw and placed his rough hand against the side of Arthur's neck.

"I will see to it personally that this man gets the hardest sentence possible," he vowed in a voice which made a flood of memories surface in the warlock's mind of a great room of judgment and a cold throne.

"There was something wrong with him, Father," was Arthur's merciful answer, as he ran his hand tiredly through his hair. "He was high on drugs, it looked like; I'm not even certain he was trying to hit me."

Merlin felt his eyes darken as he remembered Morgana's iciness as she had sent the cruel command in her magic. Still, the warlock never made a sound, his elbows on his knees and eyes following the father and son as they spoke together as though he was not even in the room. He'd once complained that he was the most powerful man who ever existed and he was forced to live like a shadow in the presence of those who knew him, to watch and listen but never have his own say; he would never complain about such a thing again. (1)

"I'd like to hear what he has to say for himself, when he's in his right mind," Arthur went on calmly, as he rubbed at his right eye with the knuckles of his hand (looking for all the world like a little boy), "or at least as much in his right mind as he can be, before I make a judgment upon him for his actions. It might simply be that he needs more help than punishment; otherwise, he'll just go back to the same life once he's served his time."

Merlin looked down at his own fingers with a tiny smile at the compassion and simple solidity of Arthur's logic.

"This is the same man who you said held a gun to Colin's temple and threatened his life over a mobile phone, Arthur," Anthony reminded him, and it served his purpose, it seemed, because Arthur's face lost some of its soft compassion.

"You're right, Father," he said, his voice sterner and colder now, though not entirely deficit of that same mercy. He never once glanced at his friend, but Merlin did not have to see his face clearly to understand the reason for his change of attitude, and the warlock felt warmth in his heart all over again.

There was a small moment of silence, in which Arthur began rubbing his forehead in that way he always did when he was getting a headache from a pressured day, and Merlin saw it right away and stood without a word.

Anthony seemed to comprehend the voiceless indication, his dark eyes flickering to his son's loyal secretary, and he put his hand against Arthur's face once more in a tender gesture and murmured to him.

"You get some rest now, son. Sleep in tomorrow."

Arthur smiled sleepily in return.

"Thank God for weekends," he said wryly, and nodded with a slight wince. "I'll see you later, then, Father."

Anthony patted his shoulder, and Colin led the elder Gregory to the door, opening it for him respectfully.

The man paused for a moment and glanced back into the flat, where he could see Arthur moving around as he settled into his favorite chair.

"Take care of him, Colin," he said quietly and sincerely, looking back to his son's seraph-faced assistant with meaning in his black-brown eyes.

Merlin held his somber gaze and nodded understandingly.

"I will, sir," he said, and meant it with all his soul.

Anthony gave him a smile which was probably the broadest and most sincere he had to offer.

"I know you will."

Merlin closed and locked the door behind him, and when he turned back again, he wondered if there was not more of Uther in Anthony Gregory than he'd first imagined.

* * *

So many thoughts were spinning around in Arthur's aching head that he did not even notice it when Colin went to the kitchen and filled a glass of water from the refrigerator. Then again, perhaps he did not notice because he was so very used to the other man's presence wandering about his flat, cleaning dishes and washing clothes and doing who knew what else that wasn't even part of his list of responsibilities as secretary. The two assistants he'd had in the past had barely even stepped into his apartment; Colin was there almost every other day; at nine o'clock sharp, every night he stayed there, he left, unless Arthur asked him to stay for some reason or another, and then he dropped his scarf back down and joined him at the table or on the couch for a drink and organizing papers or whatever the young Gregory needed doing.

He didn't know why Colin stayed with him always, but deep inside, he was glad. He'd never liked being alone.

"Here."

He looked up, his hand dropping from his hair, and gratefully took the glass of cool water from his friend's hand.

"Thanks," he muttered, taking a small sip of it.

Colin sat down on the corner of the sofa angled beside him.

"You okay?" he asked quietly, and then more firmly, "And don't say you are if you're not really, Arthur."

The young man looked down into the clear water and contemplated for a moment. It was his every instinct to react bravely, to repeat the same trifles of "I'm fine," "Don't worry," and "I'm not a coward," he'd always repeated when he was afraid, to his father, his friends (What had happened to them? He hadn't even thought of them in a month….), everyone. To Colin, however, he hadn't even considered lying.

"I felt the bullet," he said, never looking up for fear of Colin looking at him the way his nanny had when he was a little boy who insisted that his nightmares had really happened in the past. "I felt it hit me, Col. I know I did."

Colin was quiet for a brief moment, and then, with not laugh of dismissal or a tone of disdain,

"I read that, sometimes, if you really believe in something, it seems real to you even if it's not. Like when you're half-sleeping and you think you're falling, and you jolt awake, or if you're alone in a room and you think someone is calling your name from a distance."

(Merlin knew this feeling well, for in the time following Arthur's death, he'd heard his strong voice shouting Merlin's name for weeks until it had finally vanished from his imagination.)

Arthur did not look up at him, but he asked, with hope,

"Do you really think that could be it, Colin?"

"I'm certain of it," answered his friend. "Your brain was just momentarily confused, that's all."

"But why my heart? Why my chest and not my head or arm?"

Perhaps he was digging for answers that were not necessary, but for so long, Arthur had been living with the fear that there was something mentally wrong with him. He'd been seeing things in his dreams which he could not explain nearly all his life, and since the plane crash, and the dream-Merlin's voice and eyes matching a man's he'd never met until recently, such fears had magnified. He felt sound in mind and in body, but couldn't that be just another symptom? He'd heard that solid belief in their own sanity made insane patients all the more difficult to control….

He shuddered and ran his fingers through his hair once more. The water in his cup had begun to quiver with his hand.

"Perhaps," said Colin slowly, carefully, "it has something to do with those dreams you have—the ones where you think you've been struck."

"I am not insane, _Colin_," he spilled out before he could stop himself, and then he felt suddenly humiliated at himself, and hastily looked away again.

He felt the boy's surprise beside him, and felt even more embarrassed and ashamed of his outburst. Nothing surprised Colin.

"I know," came the mild reply. "I was just trying to convince _you_."

He wasn't exactly sure how to answer to that, so he didn't. All he could think of was how he'd imagined Colin's eyes flash gold for a bare second, and how his brain was so convinced of the fact that it was Merlin's eyes in front of him, before he'd regained his composure. What if it wouldn't be just a moment the next time? What if his delusion lasted longer, and he thought himself to be fighting someone, like in his nightmare about Elyan's being possessed by the Druid boy, or the little scruple in the tavern where they'd first met Gwaine, or in that horrible war with Morgana, the latest his dreams ever reached? What if he hurt someone? What if he hurt a stranger, or a coworker, or his father? What if he hurt Colin?

Then, there was a gentle hand on his head, smoothing down his hair where he'd ruffled it up in his nervousness, easing the pounding in his temples without actually meaning to do so. He had an unexpected thought that Colin was almost like a misplaced parent, and that he certainly couldn't explain, because Colin was surely no older than he himself was. Perhaps it was because of the man's wisdom, or the way he took such good care of him…but that last was just a part of his job, really; he knew his father paid Colin extra to keep close attention to his care….

"There was something you wanted to tell me."

The young Gregory looked up with question in his eyes and found Colin concentrated upon brushing down a persistent hair on the back of Arthur's neck.

"What?" he asked, attention drawn from his problems to yet another random statement from his prating secretary (and perhaps that was the intention).

"Earlier today," Colin said, dropping his hand as he realized Arthur's slightly long hair was not going to comply any time soon, "this morning, you said you had something you wanted to tell me over lunch. We never got to lunch, obviously, so do you want to tell me now?"

It took Arthur's rather sluggish mind a moment to recall—that very morning felt like days ago now—and then his eyes lit up in remembrance and he answered.

"Oh, yes. Well, besides that, there was also the issue of your stupidity regarding life-or-death situations."

Colin had the grace to look slightly ashamed, and he looked away to fumble awkwardly with the sleeve of his shirt.

"Ah, right…"

"Your idiotic actions today only make me see that my decision is a good one," Arthur said, sounding more like himself as he sat up with his posture straight and sure and looked directly into Colin's eyes. "First of all—"

Seeing his boss' sudden shift to authority, Colin also sat up straighter to show that he was listening.

"—I'm getting you a cell phone. I know you said you don't like them, but your preference to talk to a person 'face-to-face' seems a bit controversial when you're hardly ever around when I need to tell you something."

"I am always around," Colin argued, but Arthur did not even bother stopping to acknowledge him.

"Second of all, you're going to have to grow a brain, Colin; otherwise, I'll have to fire you."

"I have a brain," came the second argument, but once again, it was ignored entirely.

"Fighting the guy holding a gun to your head is not the sort of intelligent thinking I need in a secretary. If you die because of some foolish move on your part, I'll be the one left hunting down a new personal assistant, and my father will insist on picking one out for me. I've told you about Mrs. Osprey."

Colin's grimaced and nodded.

"That's exactly the sort he'll choose," Arthur went on, "and much as I dislike the way you go about working for me, I really don't want another one of her around. Is that understood?"

What was understood was that Arthur Gregory was just the same as Arthur Pendragon—never willing to admit his feelings and making up ridiculous excuses for them instead—but Merlin never said as much and just settled for,

"Yes, sir."

"Third of all, the flat just below mine was vacated three days ago; the renters moved to California, so, starting tomorrow, you'll be living there."

Merlin was actually startled at this, and he allowed it to show on his face.

"Will I?" he asked, a bit of a challenge, which, naturally, Arthur met.

"Yes," he affirmed, "if you want to continue in my service; I'll pay the rent as part of your salary. It takes entirely too long for you to get here when you're supposed to be, and this way it'll be easier for me to reach you when you're not answering your cell phone…which I know you probably won't half the time, anyway."

Merlin bit his lip to contain a smile. Arthur was most likely right.

"Besides, I'm surprised you haven't been beaten up or worse yet, living in that rattrap of a neighborhood," Arthur carried on without pausing. "I think I saw that man who held us up today wandering around last time I was there."

"You did not!" Merlin exclaimed evenly, but he was so glad to see Arthur acting like his old self again instead of looking so troubled, he was grinning as he said it.

"I did," Arthur laughed back, entirely joking but adamant nonetheless to push his longsuffering friend. "I'll bet he gets high on those 'natural healers' of yours."

"He does not!" Merlin retorted in the same manner as before.

"Sure." Arthur grinned broadly at him, and then held out his hand. "So do we have a deal, then, Col?"

Merlin looked down at his hand, and felt something warm and wonderful in his chest as he returned his strong grip, feeling the cool silver of the plain ring on his index finger as he did.

"We have a deal, sir."

From that day forward, everything got better than before.

**To be continued  
(in Part iv)**

* * *

(1) Reference to The Sorcerer's Shadow (Episode 11, Season 3), at 30:28.

* * *

_As far as that drug addict guy goes, I know his language sounded American; that's because I am American. We'll just pretend he's from Chicago or something. I know not a whole lot happened in this part; I hope I didn't bore you or anything! There were some things in this chapter that were necessary more than just to make you say, "Awwwwwh, how cute." ;) Just keep the story of Mordecai Shultz fresh in your mind, and remember Arthur's worries about his own sanity regarding his visions and dreams; these things are important!  
Part 4 features more evil Morgana, some emotionally distraught Arthur, and a cliffhanger for poor Merlin. Hope you'll keep reading!  
Songs for this part (in addition to those from Part 2):  
The Call by Regina Spektor  
Found A Way by Drake Bell (I know, I know, but the lyrics are perfect! x))  
Good Time by Owl City (yeah, fine, this one's a bit of a joke regarding this chapter, but an authoress is allowed to make fun of her own story, or it's just not fun…and this is a good song to check out, anyway!)  
And remember that there's magic in you, etc., etc.. :P_


	4. Part iv

_Ciao, ladies e gentlemen. I hope you 'ave been eh-doing well this eh-week. Welcome to the Parte 4 of the story The Voice in the Dream on this a-fine Friday evening. Spaghetti under the stars?  
Okay, sorry, I'm done now. Been reading way too much about Venice lately for my own mental good. That, plus I think the sunburn is starting to get to my head…don't ask. Just remind me never to expect the sun to make an exception for me ever again.  
ANYWAY. I commend you for making it this far in this monster of a fic; if you haven't made it, thanks for trying anyway. I'll send you some spaghetti.  
Okay, *now* I'm done.  
I know there's a *lot* of long paragraphs, especially here in the beginning, but I thought that would be more convenient than me trying to write out a hundred little scenes; perhaps I'll elaborate on something in there in the future. Just let me know if you'd like to see a separate fic written about anything below, or if you have your own plot bunny for this story's setting you'd want me to write out. My plot bunny cage is open for you._

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Part iv**

As it happened, there were hundreds of spells Merlin hadn't ever learned.

The day after Arthur had insisted on taking him to get a mobile phone while the movers brought his things from his old flat to the new one, Merlin had gone to the oldest bookstore in London, down to the basement where he knew he would find for what he searched. He dusted off a few of the old books he'd never really looked through in the years when the place had been a fortune-teller's abode in the early eighteenth century; here he found Middle Eastern incantations he'd never before heard of, even in the short period when he'd lived in the Middle East.

In the months that followed, Merlin put all of his efforts into finding such spell books and documents from which he could learn. He thought himself a fool to have assumed he'd mastered all the magic there was to master just because he knew every spell from across Britain. There was much foreign power he had yet to possess, and learning such strange things from ancient, mystic parchments from all over the world was like opening doors to whole realms of magic he'd always known existed but had never had the will or the conviction to comprehend. His true reason for learning new magic had died along with Arthur, and he had spent long years repeating the same dull incantations—still loving his magic, and grateful for it every day, just…lonely, he supposed was the word, and that made him lazy.

Now, Arthur laughed at him when he entered his flat and asked why Colin had suddenly decided to become a chemist, while his clumsy fingers tried to mix the strangely-colored liquids together under "Colin's" supervision, and Merlin was forced to de-magic much of it before Arthur could accidentally conjure a manticore or something else that might shock him into a mental breakdown. Merlin didn't mind; he hoped that the sight of the apparatuses might at least partially encourage Arthur's memories of the physician's chambers after magic had been freed in Camelot, of when the king would stop to visit for some reason or another and find his warlock mixing potions or doing some other sorcerer-like activity.

These days, Merlin spent hours strengthening his spirit with untouched magic in his beautiful flat just below Arthur's, and where had once been the stone-and-wood city of Camelot out the window of his workplace, there was now the metal-and-glass city of London.

That is, there he spent the hours that _weren't_ taken up with the fast-pace world of assisting a Gregory.

Apparently, there was more to the last name than just going to an office every day; there were dinners with important people, and assemblies for less important people, and committee meetings for the building of orphanages, and _visiting_ orphanages, and hospitals, and also there was the fact that they evidently ran a weapons trading company somewhere as well, which meant there was double of everything. Oh, _and _the Gregorys were apparently some fifth or sixth cousins of the royal family; Anthony was a politician as well, which made Arthur the son of a politician.

Arthur was in line for the throne. Very, very far down the line, and likely never even to be considered, but that did not make Merlin react with any less exuberance and startlement when he learned of it, much to Arthur's embarrassment and amusement.

The reporter whom Merlin had gracelessly ignored, Pamela Peters, had not wasted any time in spreading the word about the crashing of Arthur's plane and what sort of "fascinating" roll his new "attractive" assistant Colin might have in it, and that only had served to add more interviews to the already-long list, which had been so long anyway because Arthur was about to take his father's place in the position of (what Merlin called "overlord;" what they called "CEO") of Camelot Banks. Anthony Gregory wanted to partially retire, which meant that he would be only in control of the weapons company and his son would take charge of the banks. Merlin could only imagine how much increase there would be to Arthur's—made his—workload when that happened.

This was all notwithstanding the fact that he, too, had to appear at most all of these places, including the interviews where talk show hosts wanted to know how he had allegedly saved the life of the famous Arthur Gregory (twice), what is it like being his personal assistant, are you currently dating him, etc.

Merlin wanted to shudder each time a bubbly-voiced female interviewer said with sincere disappointment something to the effect of, _"Oh, but you two make such a cute couple!"_ Most of the time, Arthur did for him. They generally didn't talk about that part of the interviews.

In less than six months, he had been on the covers of three different high-class magazines, posing with Arthur; he wondered at times if that were normal, for P.A.s to be so often included in their boss' publicity. When he'd asked, Arthur could offer no answer but to shrug and tell him about how one of the older women at the office had told him it was because he and Colin made such a natural team. _"You're like two sides of the same coin,"_ she'd said, and Merlin could see by the way Arthur skipped over that detail that it had sparked more of the flashbacks from his dreams when she'd said it, so he never pressed, but marveled at it in his own heart.

The first time they had been for a photo shoot, and interview on Arthur's part, Merlin had been in the white background, on the left side, with Arthur as the focal point; Arthur Gregory, though not necessarily a great fan of it, was excellent at posing for magazines. Merlin, on the other hand, was forced to hold a blank clipboard and a pen that did not actually write while attempting to look busy and concentrated.

Arthur had laughed at the picture and made jokes about how Colin looked like he was constipated; Merlin had retaliated by telling him he looked like a bone-idle toad.

That particular phrasing had made Arthur's eyes go dull once more.

…"_You look like a startled stoat."_

"_Yeah? Well at least I don't look like a bone-idle toad. Let's go."_

"_You're saying I look like a toad?"_

"_Yeah, and maybe one day you'll magically transform into a handsome prince, but since magic's outlawed that'll probably never happen. Come on; let's go."..._ (1)

In the second magazine, Merlin—or Colin, as he was called by the oblivious public and by Arthur—played a more dominant part, standing behind the leather chair where Arthur sat with his legs crossed and fingers interlaced _"…so that you look smarter than you actually are,"_ he'd explained to his boss, and was rewarded with a solid punch to the arm from his friend and a disapproving look from Anthony.

The third was the one which caught his eye—the one which brought him to stare and wonder if the gods weren't just playing with his head now. In this one, they sat back-to-back, as Arthur had been for a long while explaining how Colin did much of the work put into the various charities he funded and the organizer (an idealistic woman, again) had thought it nice to set them up with Colin more of an equal, since Arthur had painted him as such in his speech at the charity banquet a week earlier.

(Another notable quality of this new Arthur which was slightly altered from his first life was that he was somewhat more inclined to give his assistant the credit he was due. Merlin wondered if that were because, in some astronomical form, Arthur was making amends for all the times when he'd never done so as both prince and king.)

On this cover, Arthur sat on the corner of a beautiful fountain, angled toward the camera, and Merlin's back was against his. Merlin—now better at playing the part of Colin James the Versatile Secretary than he had been initially—smiled a bit over his shoulder, while Arthur looked directly at the camera with a piercing gaze (which Merlin had, hilariously, caught him practicing in the vague reflection of his own mobile a few minutes previous).

The theme of the charities was fairytales, and, true to his character, they had dressed Arthur as a knight in shining armor (because he was, apparently, "a hero to many people worldwide"). Merlin had been too distracted in watching how Arthur took to the heavy, hot chainmail with such ease as if he'd been wearing it all his life, and how his gemstone eyes dulled with his ancient dream-memories so many times that day; the warlock had never even noticed how they'd dressed him, and mechanically had obeyed when they'd told him to hold his hand palm-up in the cover photograph.

He didn't notice, that is, until they saw the finished shoot themselves, and he gazed down at the picture in his hands. Arthur in his glinting armor, and he in his indigo robe, with the Once and Future King bearing a sword in his hand and Merlin with an orb of white magic photoshopped into his palm.

Neither he nor Arthur knew what to say or do when they saw it. Arthur was so haunted by the dreams that he managed to stammer out a compliment about the editor before he excused himself. Merlin hid the picture away in his flat, in a drawer with all of his most treasured possessions, and that night, he pressed his fingers to his eyes and fought away the burning tears while he gazed at it in awe.

Arthur refused to look at it again, but the dreams which visited him that night were long and real, of himself in authentic armor from the forges of Camelot, and his Merlin—still bearing Colin's voice and eyes and ring in his mind—in his simple cloak. He dreamt of streams filled with water spirits and skies filled with dragons, of potions and shields and childish games of tag in an open field where the knights would chase Merlin for using his magic to cheat while the young warlock laughed freely at them.

It had been weeks since such a dream had come to him; since the incident with the shooting, there had been little of his delusions apart from vague voices springing up when Colin said or did something which struck his imagination like déjà vu—small things which he could easily ignore and forget. The dreams which reached him when he slept for all the time during that particular charity were impossible to ignore and even more so to forget, but he wouldn't ever want to ignore or forget them anyway, as happy as he was in them.

They fell into a sort of rhythm, Arthur and Merlin; Arthur dragged his little assistant all over London—and indeed, the world—for business, and Merlin held his head high as he walked alongside his king through streets of great cities where he'd once walked alone, letting him talk all he wanted about anything he wanted and doing all he could to make his hectic life more fun. He went with him and watched in interest as he was awarded as champion at various fencing "tournaments" (which really weren't tournaments at all, in the true definition, but Arthur seemed to enjoy them immensely nonetheless). He even used his magic to help him win a football game, once; he was not a cheater, but the way Edgar Peters of the opposing team (an apparent jealous rival of Arthur's skill since the fourth grade) had snidely treated his longsuffering friend had justified it in his own mind (particularly since Peters had cheated first, unbeknownst to anyone but the warlock). Arthur gave Merlin money to buy chocolate and oranges (because Merlin loved oranges even more than he loved chocolate), and Merlin got his boss delicious, hazelnut coffee in the mornings to replace the crap cups Arthur used to buy himself when he was in a hurry.

Arthur complained constantly about his assistant's supernatural ability to get into his flat or office at any time of the day he so chose without setting off any kind of alarm. Merlin generally did this daily because each time Arthur found him in his locked office or flat, the young man shook his head and called Colin an _"idiot wizard."_

Merlin knew that their bond was settled forever when three months after his initial employment, Arthur insisted he replace his old, ripped, and discolored sneakers with a new, more reliable pair, because he looked like "a shabby orphan" and if he insisted on wearing sneakers with tuxedos to important galas and banquets, he could at least have a pair that didn't look like he'd pulled them out of a dumpster. Merlin insisted back that the white skidgrips were the best he could afford; mostly he just said this because he had been fond of the pair since he'd bought them in 1973. When Arthur heard his money-based argument, he shut up immediately.

A week later, Merlin sat down at Arthur's desk (after unlocking his office door with no key, as always), and found a package in his name. When he opened it, whatever attachment he'd had for his old sneakers was gone as he removed a pair of seventy-pound Converse skidgrips, custom-designed, pristine white with red and blue details and a "personal ID tag," the numbers 949273, sewn in tiny, blue numbers on the outer side of either shoe. He wore them every moment of every day since, his old pair taking the duty as hanging flowerpots for herbs in his flat. (2)

They bantered constantly, Merlin grinned as Arthur laughed aloud, and since the plane crash had increased Arthur's (and, somehow, his own) popularity as a celebrity, they were occasionally photographed and filmed by passersby (sometimes when neither of them even knew of it, which served for a good laugh as they surfed through the Internet on long flights).

Merlin cherished every moment of it. For six months, he was neither a warlock nor an immortal; he was simply himself, with Arthur, and nothing could have been better. He was always on guard for Morgana, however, but since she'd watched him heal the king's fatal wound that day on the street, she hadn't reappeared. She schemed, he was sure, waiting in the shadows for her moment to strike, like a snake in the night. She still needed the enchantment to find and wield Excalibur; she would not give that up.

He welcomed her return. He wanted her to know exactly how closely he guarded his Once and Future King this time.

Then, on a dark November night, Anthony Gregory was abruptly murdered in his own bed.

* * *

The lift doors of the rich apartment building in eastern London closed on a dark woman, pale as the moon, with lips as red as rose's petals and hair like the rolling waves of a midnight ocean.

When they opened again on the top floor, it was the same dark chocolate dress, but the woman wearing it had hair curled in ringlets of sun-lightened blonde and a simple face which one would forget after moments of glancing it in a crowd—and of course, that was the reason for her guise.

She slumped her shoulders in a manner that was nothing resembling the pride associated with her true form, her eyes filling with tears which would never spill were she not prepared for this role. Once she was certain she would be convincing enough to touch the feelings of the unicorn-hearted king of Camelot, she shuffled down the hall and rapped upon his door.

* * *

Arthur moaned and rolled over, hoping against hope that the relentless thundering upon his front door would give up and just _go away_. If there was one thing he'd learnt without doubt in his months living upstairs from his idiotic assistant (though _how_ Colin actually assisted was still a mystery; the man didn't even know how to run a diagnostics scan on a desk computer the first week), it was that Colin James never just _went away_, unless he looked into Arthur's eyes and was absolutely certain his boss meant it when he told him.

Of course, that would require Arthur actually getting up out of the bed to go answer the door, something he wasn't thrilled about doing at three thirty-six in the morning on a weekday.

With another groan, this one more of a ragged ire than his initial ones of removal from sleep, he hurled back the blankets of his bed and stomped toward the door; he did not bother with a shirt, his sweatpants hanging around his hips as he turned on the lights in his path and grumbled about how it was so easy for stupid little Colin to burst into his room every morning without ever needing to be let in and so difficult for him to keep from disturbing him when he wanted in at night.

"'_Not supposed to be here at night,'_" Arthur mumbled, mimicking Colin's whiny voice when he'd asked him just why he thought it necessary to bang on the door whenever he forgot his knapsack or whatever. "'_Can't just break in without permission._' Like he gets permission otherwise."

Sometimes he thought Colin just liked to bother him.

It was to his complete surprise, then, that he opened the door with Colin's name on the tip of his tongue to find the opposite of his ridiculously peculiar and adorable friend standing before him.

"Kate!" He took one look at the tears streaking her familiar, pleasant face and any resentment he felt for her disturbance of his rest fled him.

"Hello, Arthur," she greeted him, and her voice was soft and fearful, nothing like it had been when she'd been his father's strong and clever assistant.

"What are you doing here?" he questioned, and there may have been a bit of ingratitude in his tone; he knew it was probably undeserved, but he'd always felt that she was loyal to their family and her seven-month disappearance was not something he could easily forget.

"Can I come in?" she questioned, her light blue eyes glancing up at him from beneath long lashes.

Arthur was never one to hold a grudge; however displeased he was about her abandonment after he had just begun to think of her as a slightly annoying little sister, he could not deny her anything when she looked at him like one begging for harborage.

He nodded and held the door open for her as she tiptoed inside.

Without another word between them, he set a drink down in front of her and tugged a shirt on over his head as she sipped at it delicately. Arthur, who was not nearly as unobservant as Colin insisted he was, did not miss it when Kate's fingers trembled as she set the drink aside with barely any of it gone.

"Now," he said, as he sat down across from her so that their eyes were locked evenly, "tell me what's wrong. What is it, Kate?"

She sniffled, and that alone cast a shadow across his face; Kate was never disturbed to the point where she lost any of her composure. It was part of the reason why Anthony had hired her three years before, though she was just barely out of Uni.

"There's something I…I have to tell you," she said, but with the hesitancy she used, it was clear she still debated whether or not she should.

"All right," he said. "What? Don't be afraid, Kate."

She shivered again, though the flat was warm, and met his gaze with watery eyes.

"It's your secretary, Arthur—it's about him. He's—"

"Colin?" Arthur questioned, because he couldn't think of any reason why simple Colin could have anything to do with her state of mind. "What about him?"

She was shaking in earnest now, and he reached out and grabbed her thin forearm, noting how she seemed thinner and less healthy than she had been.

"He'll…kill me, if he finds out I said anything," her words tumbled out in desperation.

Arthur's face darkened, and many thoughts rose up in his mind all at once. Colin's past was a mystery; everything about it was, for he'd never wanted to push his friend into telling him anything. He knew Col had an intricate and active history; what little the boy had told him that first day in his rickety old flat had been enough to indicate this. He even had a sense that there was trouble and trial in that past, and to hear Kate's fears now made him suddenly worry for with what Colin may have become involved.

"No harm will come to you here," he assured his friend gently as he could. "Tell me what it is you're scared of."

She sniffed, and swiped at her eyes, and looked at him once more with burning intensity.

"He's not who you think he is, Arthur," she whispered with a hard, cold surety which cut him deeply to the core, though he knew not why. "He's dangerous."

"Colin?" Arthur refrained himself from a quiet laugh at the improbability of that statement. "Kate, I don't know who you're thinking of, but _my_ secretary is about as dangerous as a sleeping kitten. He's a complete daffodil, really."

She shook her head at that, and all of his humor vanished when she sobbed into her sleeves.

"I knew you wouldn't believe me," she wept, her voice muffled and sliding as her thin shoulders shook.

"Whoa, hey." Arthur instinctively slid his chair around the corner, closer to hers, and put his arm around her back. "I didn't say I don't believe you, Kate; I know there are a lot of dangerous people after my father and our family for a lot of reasons—for his political life, mostly, but you don't know Colin. He's been my assistant for nearly seven months now; I've never had any reason not to trust him."

"I know," she whimpered, leaning against him like he was a safe older brother and clutching his soft shirt. "That's what he wanted."

Arthur was grateful she couldn't see the totally befuddled look on his face at those words, because he was certain his what-the-hell? line of thinking would have been totally obvious.

"Why would he _want_ that, Kate?" he asked, trying his best not to make her feel foolish.

He felt her straighten her shoulders, and she pushed away from him to sit up in her chair; there were no more tears in her eyes, but a solid sort of conviction that what she was about to say _needed_ to be said.

"He lied to you, about everything," she whispered, fearfully. "Arthur, Colin is the grandson of Mordecai Shultz."

"Father's old partner?" Arthur questioned immediately, uncomprehending and unprepared for such a twist in subject.

"He's insane, Arthur," she wept, breaking off again, and the man wrapped his arm around her again.

"Just tell me, Kate," he soothed, and Arthur never knew that while he had been hugging her in comfort, Morgana's eyes had flashed gold behind her lids.

As "Kate" began to spill her story of deception, lie after lie about "Colin Shultz" drifted into Arthur's ears and settled in his mind where she had passed a spell that would keep the thoughts of doubt locked there, and eventually, keep everything else away.

After she had left his flat two hours later, he leant against the door with his head reeling with her final words.

"I came to you tonight, Arthur, because I couldn't let him do it. Please, don't let him do it. Colin is going to kill your father."

The piece of Arthur which had belonged to Merlin since the beginning of time fought against the bitter lies of the witch while he slept that night, pushing them away from the young man's consciousness. The magic that was within him kept the wicked Morgana's words from him so that his mind might not be turned from Merlin, but it would only keep it away for so long before it broke free. It would only be so long before he would remember "Kate's" accusations, and he would have to decide exactly who Colin James was for himself.

Meanwhile, the black magic began to slowly seep through Arthur's veins until it settled in his mind, where he could not escape it.

* * *

Merlin never learned of Anthony's death until the day after it had happened.

He arrived at the door of Arthur's flat at nearly eight in the morning, which was a later time than had been regular since the young man had overtaken his father's duties at the bank. He held hazelnut-flavored coffee in one hand (for it worked better than enchantment to rouse Arthur in the mornings) and his leather-bound planner in the other (for he still preferred the old-fashioned combination of paper and pen to the tiny buttons and too-bright screen of his iPhone). He barely even paused as he used his magic to influence the locked door and pushed it open with his back just as he did every morning, much to Arthur's ignorance.

He felt a strange sort of alarm when he entered and found the whole place empty, his master's bed unmade and his wallet and cell phone tucked away in his nightstand drawer.

Forty-five minutes later, the warlock entered his friend's rich office to begin his regular duties with the expectation that if he did not reappear by noon, Merlin would start searching.

He found Arthur sitting behind the desk, glassy-eyed and lost in the wretched day-dream of Uther's death; Uther's and Anthony's faces flickered back and forth in his mind as the same lifeless corpse, one lying in his great bed beneath the shocked gaze of an innocent sorcerer, and the other lying in the floor of his uptown apartment with a hole pierced into his heart.

When Merlin rounded the desk, startling him awake from his delusion, Arthur's eyes brimmed with tears he never allowed to spill as he told him of the call he'd received—of how the retired neighbors his father had always grumbled as being "meddlesome" had worriedly contacted him after hearing the elder Gregory scream terribly through the walls.

Arthur had found Anthony in a puddle of his own blood with a blade, strangely medieval and curved like a slithering snake, in his chest. Merlin wondered if Anthony remembered being Uther in the seconds before he died.

For the next three hours, the warlock sat upon the desk facing his king. He never spoke. He just stayed with him.

Arthur never sent him away.

* * *

On the day of the funeral, Morgana watched.

The first time Uther had died, she never got to see it. She never got to see the pain and fear strike his features when he woke up for a scarce moment only to realize he was dying. She never got to hear Arthur accuse the old sorcerer—whom she later discovered was Merlin…_Emrys_…all along. She never got to see the people mourn their "strong and wise" king, or hear the pyre crackle as it burnt to ashes the man who had been her downfall into darkness.

She never got to watch Arthur's eyes.

Perhaps if she had then, it might have guilted her, haunted her, made her feel a sweep of injustice in her cruel actions just for a moment. Now, however, the unshed tears dimming the eyes of the Once and Future King gave her no such feeling. From her place half-hidden behind an old oak in that hundred-year-old cemetery, where her midnight gown would not be so conspicuous as it might be in the streets, she smiled at the sight of the mourners, and her smile grew as she remembered how it felt to plunge her dagger into the heart which was and was not Uther's.

Her smile vanished, however, when she caught sight of Merlin through the shifting crowd of black. He never knew she was there, so close, concentrated as he was upon his friend at whose side he stood loyally.

She watched as he cast a furtive glance to his left, where Arthur stood so close to him that their shoulders—both clad in mourning black—were pressed together. The warlock kept reading his king's face for long moments, and then he would look away, moving his eyes back down to the dark coffin now lowered into the ground.

Morgana's fingers twitched into a fist. She knew from the supernatural death of the reborn Mordred that Emrys could not die, and yet her magic itched in her palm to be used against him. How could he, who had witnessed Uther's cruelty first-hand just as much as she had, and who had become so cold and bitter in the thousand years he'd spent alone, still side with the Pendragons? How could he stand there, holding such power in his ancient fingertips, and still be little more than a servant to the son of the man who had slaughtered thousands of their brethren? It was the ugliest and blackest kind of betrayal, to be the strongest magical being ever to exist, and to protect the blood of the one who had caused so much sorrow to magic all across the land.

Merlin should be controlling Arthur with his mighty powers. He should see Morgana as an ally, stand with her to right all the wrongs in the world done by feeble and pathetic mankind. They could be like gods, the two of them, if he would only be with her instead of against her.

That would never be, however, and this she knew well. She would have to force him to reveal Excalibur to her, if there was any hope.

She had chosen this time with intent. Arthur was inexperienced in the ways of the world yet; he was not ready to take on the duties left to him by his dead father. More than that, he was troubled in his own mind—seeing images and having attacks the first Arthur had never had to bear. Mordred had planted this in his mind when he was but a boy in their hopes that he would recall where and how Merlin had hidden Excalibur, so that they might take that knowledge from him when the time was right. That was before he learnt that the warlock himself still lived.

Now, as she saw the dark marks beneath the so-called "king's" eyes, how the weariness in his face was not solely from grief but from nightmares and visions which weakened him each day and night, she knew that this was an advantage neither she nor her deceased consort would have predicted. Perhaps someday Arthur would remember who he was, but for now, he was as stupid and ignorant about the world of magic as any other man or woman. He knew only what the dreams and delusions told him, those which he didn't believe, and he knew only as much of his dear little "Colin" as "Kate" had whispered to him. (She knew the magic would fight the memory of her visit, but he would remember eventually.) If she were lucky, he would go mad before—if ever—he recalled his destiny.

And if he did, there was nothing Merlin could do to stop it.

* * *

The next day, Merlin cleared Arthur's schedule completely despite his new positions as CEO of both Camelot Banks and Gregory Enterprises. As he entered his friend's room, he hoped inside his heart that he had managed to push away all nightmares of his father's first death from his mind as best he could—though he was discovering that some of the dreams were simply too deep for even his magic to strip away.

He brought no coffee this time, because he knew that Arthur would not drink it. He came empty-handed—but not really.

His magic glowed pale blue at his fingertips as he touched them to Arthur's soft hair.

"Sir."

The younger man's brow furrowed as he stirred slightly.

"Come on, Arthur. It's nearly eleven."

At that, he pushed himself to sit up, rubbing at his sleep-crusted eyes and smoothing down his hair as best he could.

"What time did you say it was?" he asked, his voice hoarse. Merlin hoped that it was not because he'd cried himself to sleep, though he supposed he couldn't expect any different; Anthony Gregory was every bit as emotionally awkward as Uther Pendragon, but there were many more redeeming qualities to his nature since he had not been tainted with hatred of magic. He was a better father in word and action than Uther had ever been, and for that, Merlin was grateful for Arthur's sake.

"It is ten forty-five, Arthur," he answered as he stepped back so that Arthur could push the blankets away and put his feet on the floor.

"What?" his eyes flickered up to his secretary's boyish face, drained of all sleep. "Why have you come so late, Colin? And don't tell me the lift was out of working order again, because I checked with the front desk last time, and they never knew anything about it."

"That's because I fixed it myself," Merlin defended himself. "And no, actually I was letting you sleep a bit later."

"A bit?" he repeated with an unhealthy dose of sarcasm as he stood and moved toward his bathroom. "I'm three hours late, Colin! I know you have no idea what it takes to run a company, but that is an entirely inappropriate way to start one's first day as CEO. I would have thought even an idiot like you would have been able to figure that out."

"I take it you didn't want the companies to grant you a day off, then," Merlin called out after him.

The running water abruptly went off, and then Arthur's blonde head was peering back into the room.

"What?"

"Camelot Banks and Gregory Enterprises both were adamant to give you a day off. They wanted you fully rested and well before beginning your duties there. I know you don't like not working, but I thought that one day couldn't hurt, so I accepted their offers."

In fact, it had taken a slight will-changing spell and a couple of not-so-vague urges to convince the boards that Arthur should have at least one more day, but his world-weary boss didn't need to know that bit.

Arthur's expression dropped.

"Oh," he said dumbly.

Merlin wasted no time for fear that his dear friend would fall back into his grievous state.

"Get dressed," he ordered. "We're going out."

"Out?" Arthur questioned, returning to the room and sitting back down upon his bed.

"Yes." Merlin tossed his favorite pair of jeans at him from his closet.

"Where?"

"Anywhere you want." Merlin grinned at him and threw his best dark blue tee-shirt at him, hitting him in the face. "You have absolutely nowhere to be until seven tomorrow morning. That means we could fly to Paris if you want and be back in time."

Arthur gathered his clothes in his lap and scratched his head.

"I have the whole day off," he said with limited enthusiasm. "What makes you think I want to spend it with _you_, _Col_in?"

"Because I'm your best friend?" he suggested with a shrug and a grin.

"And who was it that lied to you by telling you that?"

Merlin feigned being wounded.

"Who is, then?" he challenged.

"Jason. Jason Porter is my best friend."

"You haven't talked to Jason in five weeks, Arthur, and it's been longer than that since you've seen him."

"I have friends," he said indignantly as he slid his shirt on over his head. "More than you do, at least."

"I haven't got time for friends," Merlin told him. "I'm too busy running around after you. 'Do this, Colin, do that, Colin. What's that, Colin? A day off? No, we're going to China today, Colin. You have to have my presentation ready in thirty minutes, Colin.'"

"Are you complaining? Because I think I've done you a favor."

Merlin, more glad than anything to see that Arthur had risen at least a little from his dark mood since his father's death, couldn't truly stop smiling as his boss lugged his jeans into the bathroom and the water came on once again.

"A favor?" he called curiously after him, once the faucet had shut off once more and he was certain his friend could hear him again.

"Yes." Arthur's voice was slightly strained as he struggled to pull on his trousers without tumbling over. "I've opened your eyes—broadened your horizons, so to speak. I've given you an actual life where you were sadly lacking before."

Merlin, where he was leant against the window of Arthur's room, smiled softly and shook his head a bit. If only Arthur knew the irony in what he said sometimes….

"You should be thanking me," the young CEO declared as he exited the bathroom with his jeans on and his face looking considerably more awake.

Merlin felt a pang of something low inside his chest. As Arthur slid on his oldest pair of sneakers from where he'd kicked them under his bed at some point or another, the warlock's mind went back to the years before they had found one another—both in their first lives, and this, their second. He had been a restless young spirit without purpose before he'd met the prince who would become his other half. In the years separating them, he had been an ancient soul without light. Arthur had given it all to him; he had so quickly become his sunshine again. Looking at him now, Merlin wondered how he'd survived without him for so long.

"Thank you," he said.

Arthur looked up where he was just finishing the knot of his shoe, and if he noticed the inappropriate depth of sincerity in Colin's low tone and shining in his pale eyes, he never acknowledged it except to say, lightly,

"You're welcome."

Then, the younger man inhaled deeply through his nose as he stood. There was a heartbeat of silence, and then he looked his assistant in his eyes.

"Are you hungry, Colin?"

Merlin bit back a smile. The return of Arthur's appetite, as always, was the first sign of his recovery from grief.

"Starving," he answered, even though he wasn't really.

…"_You must be hungry."_

"_Starving."_

"_Me, too. Come on. You can make us some breakfast."…_ (3)

Arthur shook his head and the voices flittered away as softly as they'd struck him.

"Gemma's, then?" he asked. "I don't know about you, but I could really go for some alcohol. And perhaps a steak, as well."

"I want chocolate coffee," Merlin stated, not even realizing how much like a little child he sounded saying it.

Arthur rolled his eyes as they exited his apartment, and he felt himself smiling again—just barely—for the first time since finding his father dead.

"Of course you do, Colin."

Colin laughed aloud in the hall, realizing how silly he'd sounded, and Arthur didn't feel so sad anymore.

* * *

"Are you all right, Arthur?"

The young man looked up to find Colin watching him closely across the small table. His eyes were bright, the subtle green of them more visible in the low lights of the restaurant—which was, somehow, more like a luncheon café in the day and a five-star evening restaurant in the night, as though it could change form at some point when the sun was going down.

Colin had that look on his face—the slightly concerned, highly curious, extremely careful look…the exact one he always got when Arthur was having another dream about his imaginary life and his secretary had to wake him up from it…the one that made him feel as though Colin could see straight through him, past all his little fibs and light chuckles and _"Why are you bothering me again, Colin?"_, right into his soul, and thought that he might be as mad as Arthur feared he was.

This time, however, he could honestly say that he wasn't having another worrisome delusion. It felt good to be able to admit that to himself.

"I was thinking." He toyed with the cup in his hands as the dull roar of conversations floating around them and the clinking of silverware against clay plates filled his ears. "I feel so helpless, Col."

Had it been anyone else sitting there with him, he would have stopped there and not said another word, not shown another bit of weakness or desperation. This was Colin, though, and he always felt as though Colin were listening to him with all that he had—that he _wanted_ to hear him out with his whole heart. So he kept talking, and he could sense his little friend's eyes watching him with just the right amount of compassion.

"I know the police say they're doing all they can," he said quietly, so that he could be sure only Colin could hear. "I know that they're not lying. I know they want to find my father's killer."

He heard Colin sigh just the littlest bit.

"But I feel restless, just sitting here," he went on, risking a look up to his friend now and seeing Colin still listening intently to him. "I feel like I'm not doing anything. I _want_ to do something. I want to know why. Why would someone kill my father? He never did anything wrong to anyone."

He knew he was sounding more and more troubled and excited with every word, but he had seen, in their months of working together, Colin exhibit great wisdom beyond his years. Even if Arthur would never admit it aloud to him, he desperately sought for that wisdom now. He needed a calm voice. He _needed_ Colin.

"I know it's hard to understand why things happen," Colin said after a moment, and Arthur nodded in agreement and looked back down into the scant remains of his cup. "We watch people die, and we don't understand why we're left behind."

Arthur looked up at him again then, for there was something in his voice….It was a stupid reason for him to suddenly feel concerned, but the way Colin spoke was the same way the Merlin of his dreams spoke when he was sad. It was the voice he'd heard whenever he spoke of Balinor, and Gaius, and his mother. He watched Colin's face and saw a shadow of something haunted flicker over his soft features, and he could only think of Merlin.

"I know how that feels, sir," Colin went on, his eyes moving back to meet his friend's. "I know that you want revenge for what his killer has done. But you must remember no matter what happens, you cannot bring him back. You can only try to come to peace with his passing from his life to the next."

Arthur's face gained a fond softness, his troubles already soothed by the gentleness of his friend's attitude.

"You believe in an afterlife, Colin?" he asked.

The man looked down into his own glass, now empty as well, and something strange and indefinable filled his countenance.

"I do," he said with a nod of certainty. "I have many loved ones there whom I've had to say goodbye to. I know that they're all right, now, though, and I know that somehow, someday I may see them again."

The words—the choice of phrasing—Colin used made a dark feeling creep up Arthur's spine, and he could not stop himself from asking, with perhaps more affection than was appropriate, but he still couldn't push away the feeling that he was still addressing his good Merlin,

"You don't think you'll go to Heaven?"

Colin looked up once more, and his eyes, so soft and bright, like a faint whisper of something too mystical and wonderful for Arthur's eyes to see, _like Merlin's eyes_, smiled at him sadly.

"I don't know," he said simply. "Sometimes, I feel like I won't."

"Why would you feel that way?" Arthur asked immediately, and it didn't feel as though he was talking to Merlin anymore; now, he spoke straightly to Colin, his kind and smart and insolent Colin in whom he'd never found any real flaw after spending nearly all of his time with him for over six months.

Colin shrugged with a tiny chuckle.

"Is it because you think you're not good enough?" Arthur hazarded, and in his mind, he felt awkward to be asking this; he'd never made it a habit to urge personal thoughts out of someone else, but in his heart, he would never be satisfied until he was sure that his friend didn't believe a lie like this.

"I don't know," Colin murmured in honest answer, as he tapped his nail against the handle of his spoon to make a vague bell sound. "I know that I've tried to be good enough."

"Well, stop trying."

Colin's widened eyes looked to him with hesitant expectancy.

Arthur sat back in his chair and spoke with certainty and authority for which he'd always been noted.

"You _are_ good enough, Colin. There's nothing wrong with you…well, actually, I take that back."

His friend rolled his eyes, but he was smiling as he did, so Arthur took it as a positive sign.

"There are plenty of things wrong with you," he rephrased, making a mental list of all the weird and unforeseeable quirks that made his strange companion such an idiot most of the time, "but there is nothing bad in you, Col. I've met enough bad people to know how to identify one, and I tell you the truth when I say I've never met anyone who I'm sure is going to Heaven like you."

He bit his tongue then, realizing that he was letting things spill that would probably make the car ride back to their flats very awkward. He didn't even know what he was saying, if he were to be honest, but the thought of this boy being blind to his own extraordinary character and thinking himself less than what he was made Arthur angry in a peculiar sort of way.

"Just," he finished, less excitedly but with the same amount of sincerity, "don't sell yourself short, Colin. You're always better than you give yourself credit for. Remember that."

Colin looked as though he were about to speak, smiling softly, but at that moment, their waiter arrived with the bills for their meals and interrupted whatever he would say.

They took their money to the front of the restaurant, where the young man stood behind the counter wearing a green apron and offering those who paid a free sample of their American-style corn bread. When he saw Arthur and Merlin, however, his polite smile turned into a true one, and he quietly offered the young Gregory his condolences; in his truly mellow nature, Stephen immediately went on to ask,

"How are you guys doing?"

"We're doing well," Arthur answered matter-of-factly, which may or may not have been entirely true.

"How are you?" Merlin asked as he fished out his wallet.

"I'm good, thanks," Stephen answered as he took Merlin's money, his shaggy hair falling across his forehead when he looked down to the register.

"Take up flower-folding?"

He looked up at Arthur's half-joking inquiry, and when he saw the man gesturing to a vase of small, delicate-looking paper roses, he chortled.

"No," he said firmly. "Gemma's niece made those. She's a cute girl—been at school for a few years. She just went through a heartbreak and came to stay here with Gems. Oh, that reminds me; hold on. Gemma wanted me to give you two a coupon for next time."

Only he knew how the two thoughts were related, but nonetheless, Stephen scurried off into the back room, his thin legs—even longer than Merlin's, which was rather impressive—carrying him through the door into the kitchen so quickly that he almost knocked over a surprised waitress coming through the other side.

"Poor girl," said Arthur, and Merlin looked at him to find he did not mean the waitress, but was instead staring at the complexity of the paper roses in front of him. "Must have been a bad experience for her to come here to live."

"Stephen did say she was cute," Merlin pointed out with a bit of teasing in his tone. "Perhaps you should send her some real flowers."

Arthur rolled his eyes at his friend.

"It's not really my style to send a girl flowers without even seeing her. Besides, I want to know her before I date her, even if she is beautiful," he answered.

Merlin smirked and nodded, well aware of his friend's gallant nature regarding women. It was legendary amongst the rich of society.

"Perhaps_ you_ could send her some, though," Arthur went on to say, eyes alighting in that way they always did when he was getting an idea which was unusually good for him. "Just say they're from an anonymous sender. All girls like to get flowers, no matter who they're from, right? Maybe it'd cheer her up."

"Most girls, I think," Merlin answered with a smile. "I'll do that, sir."

"Good."

Once Arthur had accepted the coupon from Stephen and begun to leave, Merlin looked to make sure Stephen wouldn't notice, and then touched his fingers to the scarlet paper. His eyes flashed gold, and in the place of the white, clay jar and thin paper flowers was a patterned vase filled with seven of the most beautiful, flawless roses ever created, with scant gold glittering on the edges, and a note written in swirling cursive—"_Anonymous_."

When the girl stepped out of the kitchen, she looked up to find the front door just closing and the man in her strange dreams—_King Arthur_—disappearing around the corner of the street with a version of their Merlin who wore an oversized purple shirt and ripped jeans and white sneakers but prattled in his king's ear at his side in just the same way.

The glass Guinevere McGrath had been holding shattered on the floor.

* * *

Arthur's peace of mind lasted for only as long as he kept himself busy. When the time came for Merlin to make their supper (as he did every Friday religiously because of his love of artistic cooking, which Arthur was glad to indulge as long as he could actually pronounce the name of the dish), he took one look at his friend, saw how Arthur hesitated to push the shiny button that would take him to his own floor, and suggested that they both go to his instead.

Arthur had put up a struggle, demanding to know _"What? Scared of the little thunderstorm coming tonight, _Col_in?"_, but somehow he was sure they both knew the bickering was all just an act to keep from having to acknowledge Arthur's detestation of being alone when he was troubled. (Yet another thing which differed from the first time, but Merlin was happy not to question.)

Merlin went to the kitchen and Arthur turned on his laptop on the couch, but didn't actually use it as he moved about the room instead, exploring all the various things which Merlin had once kept crowded in a too-small side room.

Once, though much of the relics from his past signified times spent in exploration and discovery, they meant little more in Merlin's eyes than solitude and wandering—a reason why he'd had to leave the places from which each one had come. Age had been the reason most of the time; a man who was forever young could only stay in one place for so many years before people began to notice how his hair and face never changed, no matter how he hid himself from them. He could enchant his appearance as he had in Camelot, but truly, he had never actually wanted that. The longest he'd ever remained in one city was signified by several twelfth-century artifacts from Venice—masks and coins and other objects which he'd kept well-preserved.

He still shuddered to recall how many people had died when the Roman Catholics had hunted him all throughout Italy for his being an undying "vampire" and practitioner of the dark arts, never knowing that he had been keeping their water pure and healthy for the thirty years he'd lived there.

Now, each item was specifically placed as décor in his beautiful apartment, where he could look at it all and be glad for all the knowledge and journeying, now that he was with purpose once more, where no one would hunt him so ruthlessly.

Arthur, who rarely went down into his assistant's rooms except to kick him awake for sleeping in or whatnot, spent the entirety of thirty minutes curiously examining shelves lined with things he'd never before noted. There were books—endless piles of books which Arthur didn't even try to read and which were stacked like precarious towers to the side, skulls of human and various animal types which seemed to be smiling madly at him, stiff scrolls mapping star patterns and analyzing weird insects (the strange designs of some which looked more like aliens than animals), an Egyptian pendant shaped like a scarab, a stuffed raven in a cage, an urn overflowing with coins, pottery depicting victorious battles, jars with seeds and herbs with labels in Latin, clocks, crystals…then, there was one thing, in an antique china cabinet, which stood out to Arthur more than the others.

He glanced up to Colin, who was busily working by the light of hanging chandeliers in the kitchen (lit with candles, because while he'd submitted to Arthur's constant plaguing him to use the electrics lights which were_"…there for a reason, Colin…,"_ he still used mostly candles). Deciding that his friend was too distracted with unpeeling a few oranges for a salad he was making to notice him, Arthur tentatively opened the glass door of the cabinet and removed the item.

He held the wooden statuette as carefully as he could in both hands, feeling slightly surprised that it weighed so much for such a small thing. The whittled dragon was nothing extraordinary in comparison to all the things around it in the room—especially given that it was placed on a shelf beside a like-sized statuette of Buddha which, having been in banking all of his life, Arthur immediately guessed to be real gold, and several pieces of glittering, ancient jewelry which also looked genuine in worth. Still, something drew him to the figure in his hands, and he stared, contemplating, at the smooth, pale wood of it for a short moment before it struck him.

_Arthur held the wooden dragon delicately in his rough hands, keeping it over the chemical-stained table just in case it slipped from his sometimes-undexterous fingers. As he turned it over, he observed with keen eyes the skill of the craftsmanship—simple, but bearing the unmistakable mark of a man whose hands were steady and character strong._

"_It's beautiful," he said with quiet reverence, and wished deep inside his heart that he had not been so blinded by his own wrongly founded beliefs so that he might have seen the good things he'd missed in those first twenty-five years of his life._

_Merlin, who sat at the chemical-stained table across from him, smiled sadly and nodded in solemn agreement._

"_He made it for me the night before he was killed," he said, his swirling storm eyes moving to look with admiration at the only gift ever left to him by his father. "He stayed up all night to carve it out of a piece of firewood." His handsome face softened and saddened in a way which Arthur wished he could make vanish forevermore. "I never got the chance to thank him for it."_

_Arthur lowered his eyes and looked into the carved face of the dragon, seeing in its blank features a mystical touch of both the Great Dragon and the honorable Balinor of Afol, the father of the greatest warlock and friend the world could ever know._ (4)

Then, all in one instant, the vision changed in a way unlike it ever had before, the quiet scene of himself and his Merlin blown away by roaring flames arising from nowhere, flaring out from all corners of his sight, and a dragon's distant, echoing cry tearing through his head.

Arthur scarcely felt it when the statuette fell from his hands and the dragon's side split open upon the polished wood floor. His head spun, a sharp, stabbing pain piercing through his temples—no, it wasn't pain, exactly, but an explosion of pale blue sparks and burning fire in front of his eyes. He thought for a moment that he must have fallen, but when the spinning sparks and flames stopped and he came back to himself, Colin was there, holding his arm with both of his steady hands.

"You're...quick," he gasped out, pressing his palm against his head, still barely able to inhale, like he had been running for a great while, even though he knew he'd been standing still.

"Arthur," Colin's surprisingly assertive and authoritative voice murmured sharply in his ear, "what's wrong?"

"My head..." he could only manage to say, as another burning wave struck him without warning.

_The dragon, the Great Dragon Kilgharrah, swirled like a ribbon on the breeze in a black night sky, moving gracefully and terrifyingly toward him. Still, he felt no fear as he once would have; only a wary sort of trust existed now at the sight of his glowing reptilian eyes, and so he replaced Excalibur into its sheath at his side. He looked to the figure standing with him on the emerald-green hill, and waited patiently for him to address his brother—waited to learn how to address him after so many long years of incivility toward the magical creature._

_Merlin turned to face him as Kilgharrah shook the ground with his landing. His eyes were shining, his face aglow. A red scarf with tattered edges around the warlock's throat flickered across Arthur's vision._

His sight cleared once more, the images dissipating like a vapor, and the first thing he saw was a red scarf with tattered edges.

Instead of whipping in the wind, it hung motionless from an iron hatstand across the candlelit room.

"Arthur, answer me."

"I'm...I'm fine," he said, his voice shaking against his will, unable to drag his gaze away from the russet scarf which he'd never before even noticed; then, he remembered the sound of the wood cracking when he'd dropped the statuette. "Colin, your dragon—sorry. I'm sorry."

"It's fine," said the boy's voice in his ear mercifully. "It's okay. It's not your fault…..Arthur!"

He blinked in startlement as pale fingers snapped before his eyes.

"Hey!" he shouted angrily, suddenly ripped fully back into the present. "Colin!"

His seraph-faced assistant did not speak for a long moment, his large, changeable eyes gazing deeply into Arthur's as though he expected to find the answers of the universe in them. Arthur felt himself falling into another vision, of Colin's eyes—_Merlin's eyes—_watching him so closely and intensely, before a blazing fireplace where they'd both stood hundreds of times, at a time when he had no inkling of an idea who his gentle Merlin really was, and how significant were the words he spoke.

…"_I'm happy to be your servant, until the day I die."_

"_Sometimes I think I know you, Merlin. Other times…"_

"_Well, I know you. You are a great warrior. One day, you'll be a great king."_… (5)

Arthur's knees gave out again, and Colin barely managed to pull him to the corner of a nearby sofa to keep him from collapsing to the cold floor.

"I'm sorry," the young CEO gasped out, and even through the thrumming ache in his head and the distress in his heart at the increasing indomitableness of his imagination, he could feel himself grow warm with his embarrassment. "I'm okay, Col. I'm fine."

He could feel Colin's gentle hand upon his arm and his other across his back to rest on his shoulder as he bent over and tried to will away the nausea and figments washing around in his head.

"You're shaking," the other man said softly with compassion, and Arthur felt his cool hand slide across to feel the back of his neck. "You're ill, sir."

"It's nothing," he answered back, though he couldn't even convince himself with the frailty of his voice. "It's just a headache; that's all. I haven't eaten or slept a lot since—"

At that, he trailed off, unable yet—as perhaps he always would be—to voice the facts of his father's death, the image welling up in him nonetheless to make his headache all the worse…especially since twice the picture of his dead father appeared—once Anthony Gregory, chased in a fleeting moment by Uther Pendragon.

A cut-off groan escaped his mouth before he quieted it, unwilling to add it onto his embarrassment.

"I'm just tired," he said, and then he bit his tongue, wishing himself to stop talking ,because even those little words ignited a new drifting of voices from his dreams.

…"_It's going to be fine. Everything will be all right."_

"_I'm just tired."_… (6)

Colin's unobtrusive concern was a nearly palpable presence beside him, and he wanted to look up to reassure him, but he feared that looking into his bright eyes would only bring another onslaught of phenomenal figments.

"Lean on me, sir," came the modest command. "Let's get you to bed. You need sleep."

"No!"

He could not stop himself from looking up then, and Colin froze at the desperation he knew must be obvious in the look on his face. He could hardly bring himself to care, however; if he went to bed now, he would surely fall asleep from his tiredness. He could not sleep, because he knew he would only have more of the dark nightmares if he did. Better for him to stay awake in exhausted sanity than dream and awaken feeling as though he had none at all.

Colin released his grip on Arthur's forearm, but did not remove his hand altogether.

"Okay," he said simply, and then (for the thousandth time, it seemed) surprised Arthur again. "Have you ever tried improvisational cooking, sir?"

It took his mind a moment longer than it probably should have to register what his prating fool of a friend had said.

"I'm sorry?" was his reply when he finally did.

Colin's cool fingers still rested upon the back of Arthur's neck, but the young man, distracted so easily by his ridiculous secretary's fascinating character, never really noticed it when his headache began to slowly ebb away through the touch.

"It's where you pull out everything edible you've got in the kitchen and lay it out across the countertops, and you throw any ingredients that might taste well together into a bowl or a pan," Colin said explanatorily. "Then, you eat it."

"Everything edible, you say," Arthur muttered, glancing up to the kitchen across the open space, where he could see several tiny bottles of whatever it was his weird friend mixed together with his chemistry apparatuses. "In your case, that's not much, Col."

"I've got stuff to make a salad, and soup, and vada pav."

"And what the hell is vada pav?"

"It's an Indian burger," Colin told him, blinking, like _Arthur_ was the idiot here.

"Right. Because everyone just 'throws together' complicated exotic dishes."

Colin, seeing that his friend's headache was almost entirely drained from his eyes, pulled his hand back and gave him a funny look.

"So do you want to help or not?"

Arthur looked followed his small friend's fluid movements as he stood and held his hand out, and found that he could not bring himself to deny the tender-blue eyes which watched him with such hopeful expectancy.

He slapped Colin's hand out of the way, though, just to balance out the muttered submission.

* * *

"That smells disgusting."

"It's caviar. You like caviar."

"Not caviar that smells like that."

"Well, you don't have to smell it if you don't like it."

Arthur cast a look over his shoulder and caught a glimpse of Colin's pale profile where he stood chopping more lettuce to go into the salad; he kept his eyes fixed upon his expression for a moment, just to be sure he hadn't genuinely offended his friend (though why he actually would care if he did or not remained a mystery; Colin was, after all, a complete idiot, so why should the important and wealthy banker care at all what he thought?).

Colin continued chopping the lettuce as though he did not even notice Arthur's semi-worried, semi-annoyed expression.

"_You're_ the one who wanted me to stay and 'improvisationally cook' with you," the blonde man shot back once he was sure Colin wasn't being serious, as he turned and continued ever-so-slowly peeling the red-skinned potatoes.

"I meant you could, you know, put a clothespin over your nose or something," Colin told him calmly, as he elegantly moved through the narrow space of his dimly-lit kitchen to look over his friend's strong shoulder.

Arthur, not expecting the sudden inspecting presence at his arm, hastily turned his hand over to hide where he'd nicked his finger with the dull knife.

"I can see why you've never cooked before," Colin told him frankly, his quick eyes never missing anything. "You're totally terrible at it."

Arthur felt himself blush when his assistant took the potato and knife from him and saw—among the indelicate gouges in the vegetable where he'd been taking out piece by piece—the three other tiny marks on his fingertips, white where he'd just cut through the very top layer of skin.

"That is incredible."

He wasn't sure whether he should be relieved or more humiliated that the sheer wonderment in Colin's voice was absolutely genuine.

"You're the best swordsman in all of Britain, and you cannot peel a potato without cutting your finger."

The blonde man deflated and looked away into the steadily-pouring water from the faucet.

"You amaze me, Arthur," Colin told him candidly, nudging him gently out of the way so he could finish the job his boss had been working for the past fifteen minutes.

Arthur tried not to be slightly envious when his secretary's slender and dexterous fingers finished all three remaining potatoes in less than a minute, leaving not a sliver of the red skin behind or a misplaced mark upon the pale inside.

He huffed but couldn't stop a wry smile at himself as Colin smirked and raised a brow at him.

"Shut up, Colin," he muttered, circling around him to get the milk out of the refrigerator.

Merlin grinned at the familiar phrase and dumped the potatoes onto a large clay plate from the Philippines.

The warlock wondered all during the next thirty minutes, as they worked together to fix a dinner plenteous enough to feed a dozen knights, why he'd never pushed Arthur to help him cook a meal in the days of his servitude to him in the castle. Whether anything but the salad he was (solely) fixing would be worth tasting in the end was a great puzzle, but the fun they had doing it was rivaled only by flying with a dragon and using magic to play tricks on rude guests of the court.

* * *

By the time they were through, the dull look in Arthur's eyes which had been fogging the deep blue since his father's death was dissipated almost entirely, and the two of them were sitting across from one another at Merlin's rectangular table, staring down at six bowls and platters full of food they would probably never consume.

"Salad?"

Arthur made a face at his friend.

"No, thanks. I hate oranges."

Merlin smiled and set the large mixing bowl down again.

"No change there, then."

Arthur barely heard the muttered words, but something about them—the way Colin said them, or the words themselves—struck something low in his chest. He felt his body freeze, his fingers steady, held halfway above his own empty plate.

"What did you say?" The words were spilling out before he even realized what he was saying.

Colin paused as well, his bright eyes meeting Arthur's even as he stuck his fork into the dry salad piled upon his side plate.

"Nothing," he said, as though he hadn't expected his boss to hear. "It's just that my prince, the one I used to work for…he hated oranges too." He never moved his eyes from looking straightly into Arthur's, but a tiny smile played at the corners of his mouth at fond memories, and he dropped the fork back down into the lettuce, forgotten in the light of the memories. "He always gave them to me whenever he got them as a gift, but we never told anyone."

…"_Are you finished with this…erm…thing, sire?"_

_Arthur glanced halfheartedly over to the wooden plate upon which the horrid—yes, indeed, _thing_ sat, mocking him with only one portion of its ungodly divisions gone. He knew if the rest of it wasn't gone by the time his father came back, he wouldn't hear the end of how inhospitable and dishonorable it was that he didn't appreciate and adore anything given him by a foreign lord._

"_I'd tell you to burn it in the fire," he said with immense regret, "but I promised Lord Cathan that every last disgusting drop of them would be eaten with gratitude."_

"_You said that—'disgusting?'" Merlin questioned, as he continued to swipe the damp washrag around the tabletop while Arthur read._

"_If I had, I'd probably still be getting a lecture right now," he answered, and Merlin would know he wasn't joking. "You know how Father feels about esteemed visitors' feeling welcome at all times…and to all extremes."_

_He flicked the half-bitten slice of acidic fruit with his pinky finger, watching with dread as it rocked slightly and fell over._

"_It smells funny."_

_He let out a huff of mirth at the admirable bluntness of his young friend's nature, and was thankful, no matter how often Guinevere said they behaved like brothers, that Merlin had not been born a Pendragon. Uther would have killed him before he reached thirteen; of that Arthur was certain._

_Besides, Arthur couldn't imagine the horror of sharing a kingdom with such an utter fool._

_He watched as Merlin picked up the plate upon which the offending _thing_ lay barely touched, sniffing it as if he were a dog hunting a hare in the woods._

"_It's called an 'orange,'" he told him. "It's a fruit, apparently. Some sort of exotic plant tree Lord Cathan got in his travels to islands across the waters."_

"_People across the waters seem to lack imagination when it comes to naming things," Merlin concluded at that, as he observed the brightly-colored fruit more closely with his sharp eyes. "Not sure if it sounds like it's worth going all the way over to exotic islands."_

"_Yeah," the crowned prince agreed wholeheartedly. "You can try it, if you want."_

_Merlin shrugged and plopped himself into the chair beside him, abandoning the old washrag in favor of the expensive food; Arthur rolled his eyes at how his manservant—_servant_, not equal—made himself right at home in the chambers of his king-to-be, but he never objected it. (Truth be told, he rather enjoyed it…sometimes.)_

_Merlin poked one of the crescent moon shaped slices with the tip of his finger; seeing that it wasn't going to bite his fingernail off, he picked it up with considerably more courage than Arthur had the first time and brought it to his mouth._

_Arthur felt silly thinking it, but he was actually pleased to see the look of delight upon his too-skinny servant's contoured face as he took the first bite._

"_This is delicious!" came his half-muffled cry around it. "How can you not like these, Arthur? It tastes like…sunshine!"_

_The prince smirked at his enthusiasm._

"_Typical you would like them, Merlin," he joked. "Please, take the rest of it. Spare me the suffering."_

_Merlin did, and Arthur had to tell him to _"Shut up, _Mer_lin," _as he licked his fingers noisily when every bit of the orange was gone from the plate._

"_Take another," he encouraged, and the pleased feeling he'd had was replaced with that particular sensation he got only for Merlin—that one which manifested itself as a look between incurably weird and weirdly impressed._

_Merlin obeyed, and the second orange was gone in less than five minutes._

_It took Arthur a short moment to decide what to do._

"_Here." He stood_ _and pushed the sack of oranges toward his young servant. "Take them all."_

"Arthur!"

It was several seconds' time before he realized he was hyperventilating; he'd been holding his breath.

"Arthur! _Arthur_. Listen to me. It's all right. Just breathe. _Breathe_, sire."

He gasped in a shuddering breath; the vision itself still jumped around inside his head, and it caused him no pain to see it, so soft and comforting a scene, but the way it burned behind his eyes, like little sparks of electricity zapping all around his temples. He gasped again, and then a picture was in front of his eyes—hands, elegant, alabaster, stretched out, held steady in a splayed curve, and a blue sphere, swirling like living marble, glowing with a life and light which represented all of what Arthur was.

…"_So it was you."_

_Merlin never dropped his hands where they held the orb of his magic suspended for his king to see and understand._

"_It was me."…_ (7)

Arthur cried out as the blue energy in his head burnt the image of those hands into his brain—those hands which held him so safe, always, always ready to catch him, to pull him up…that blue river of magic running through the veins of his friend—_his "guardian angel;" that's what his father had said, that day when he'd awoken from the fatal bite of the Questing Beast, when neither of them knew that his dearest friend was lying, awake, in his bed below, knowing his fate and accepting it in love_. (8) The magic escaped through Merlin's crafted fingers, crafted just for his destiny.

The image of them lingered in his imagination even after the vision had faded away, just as Merlin's voice always lingered, the way his eyes did.

"No." The word escaped unwittingly, a ragged culmination of all his desperate thoughts—_It's not real; there is no blue magic; there is no kingdom…no magic…no Merlin….Not real. Not real…_

He forced his eyes open and saw the carpet first, the Arabic rug rolled out beneath Colin's table, and a fork he could not remember ever dropping beside the leg of his chair. He fought to steady his last few breaths, never lifting his head from his hands, feeling the humiliation beginning to trickle up the back of his neck.

As his nausea eased, his gaze flickered to the hand upon his knee. He was not even surprised now that it was the same; he knew it would be. Even the leather band around his skinny wrist was exactly the same.

"Arthur, can you speak?"

The voice was no different, either.

"Colin, I'm…" He was what? He did not even know.

"Does your head hurt again, sir?"

He lifted his face then, and he was nodding in answer to the man crouched beside him even as he contradicted himself by saying,

"I'm fine, Colin. I'm-I'm fine."

Colin's eyes—those eyes, the same…_dear gods, Colin was exactly the same as him_—blinked concernedly at his boss even as his hand moved from Arthur's shoulder to touch his head right where it pounded relentlessly.

"Arthur, what's wrong?"

Spoken so tenderly and yet somehow so assertively, Arthur closed his eyes and just let his forehead rest against his palm; he no longer bothered trying to hide his exhaustion or stress from the keen blue eyes which could see all about him in just one glimpse. Still, he refused to speak of it; he simply _couldn't_. To admit to such a weakness as this—the terror he felt for his increasing insanity—conflicted so with his solidly-founded pride that the words refused to reach his tongue.

He heard Colin sigh a deep, timeworn sigh, and felt him shift beside him so that he was inches closer, his right hand moving to rest upon Arthur's forearm while his left stayed where it was against his knee—like a consoling guardian. Perhaps that was exactly what Colin was.

He held a groan in his throat as that foolish thought shot out from that dark, screwed part of his mind which was becoming progressively more natural to him.

"You've got to talk to someone, Arthur. You can't go on like this forever."

He did not move, not even to take his hand away from over his eyes.

"I said _I'm fine_, Colin. That means _do not_ push me."

"Arthur—"

Whatever he would have said next was lost forever by the earsplitting clamor of thunder just outside the window, so abruptly shattering the quiet of the closing sunset that even his unflappable secretary jolted in surprise at it, his hands tensing against Arthur's arm and knee as it crashed.

For Arthur, the pain in his head flared up again at the unforeseen commotion, and it was all he could do not to tumble once more into a plaguing delusion—this one he fought with all his strength remaining until he could no longer see swords flashing across his vision and feel the ground shaking beneath his feet with a thunder reverberated by the magic in his dreams. It was going to be a vision of _that battle_; he knew it well enough to predict it now. It would have continued just where it left off, with Mordred's frozen eyes murmuring death in a place where Merlin could no longer protect him.

Once it had sunk away, back into that corner, Arthur felt his fist clench upon the arm of his chair until the joints of his fingers hurt. It was ridiculous and infuriating, this frailty; he loathed being this way with all his adamancy, but what was he supposed to do, he wondered. How can a man fight what's inside his head? It was nothing like fighting a physical foe; his own pathetic incapability to do this on his own made him more worn and strained than anything.

Before, he'd been able to convince himself that if something were well and truly wrong, he could go to his father and he would be helped and treated for whatever his condition might be; Anthony Gregory would ensure that his son was well cared for without anyone even knowing. Now, however, Arthur had no such reassurance; he was completely alone, and more than that, he was a leader, with hundreds—thousands, even—depending upon him to do his duty and maintain his father's legacy.

His head continued to throb, the pain scantly subsiding, and he felt as though he were falling apart with no way to stop it from happening. At the same time, rain began to drum heavily upon the window behind him.

Even as tears sprung into his eyes from the exhausting headache, Colin's voice whispered at his side, so quietly and intensely that he almost didn't hear, but it was just loud enough to meet the noise of the raindrops.

"I'm sorry, Arthur; I've tried, but there's nothing I can do unless you let me."

At that, he clenched his jaw and found the courage to lift his head just enough so that he might look into the gentle face of his friend, and even that sent a flash of aching pain shooting down the back of his neck to the tip of his spine.

For one instant, Arthur considered spilling his heart out then and there and telling Colin everything—how his dreams first began when he was only eight years old after his nanny found him passed out upon the living room floor for no reason at all, how they got longer and more real as he grew older and became harder to separate from reality when he first awoke from them, how he'd heard Colin's voice long before he was even thirteen years old.

Then, he recalled how utterly stupid and mad such a story would sound; even should Colin believe he was telling the truth, he would probably report him to some clinic somewhere, or at least resign from his job as his personal assistant. Arthur wasn't sure he could bear such a thing as losing his most trusted companion right now—and perhaps not ever, though he pushed that notion away as one from his frazzled mind.

"I'm sorry," he apologized, though he wasn't sure if it was because he was undoubtedly disconcerting his unprepared assistant or because Colin, for whatever reason, seemed to be the focus of the dreams.

"Arthur, come here. Come with me."

With that, Colin tugged firmly upon his arm, and Arthur was too tired to argue either the fact that his secretary was irritatingly pulling on his wrist or that he was ordering him as though _he_ were the boss between them. Instead, he stood and allowed Colin to pull him toward the sitting room, his steps considerably more steady than he anticipated with his head aching and heart pounding from the acuteness of the visions lingering still at the edges of his consciousness.

"Tell me what it is, Arthur." Colin's voice was confident and mature beyond his years as he slid to the edge of the cushioned chair beside the small sofa where he'd settled his friend.

Arthur exhaled and looked up at him; he could feel Colin listening with all he had, his bright, oval eyes unblinking and his boyish face filled with anxiousness as he awaited what Arthur would say.

"I know there's something wrong," Colin went on when Arthur said nothing. "I can see it, every day when you wake up from a nightmare, and when you get those sudden headaches. Tell me what it is that troubles you so much, Arthur. You've got to tell someone."

"I can't," he answered, though he could feel his soul struggling between his inborn doubt and self-strength and his incomprehensible desire to simply _trust_ this man who had so quickly become his best friend. "My father—I need someone I trust—"

He wasn't making any sense, he knew; it seemed that he could not form a complete sentence without coming across the wrong way.

"You _can_ trust me," came the immediately excited response.

…"_I need a servant I can trust."_

"_You _can_ trust me!"_

"_And look where it got me this time. Get out of my sight!"…_ (9)

He groaned outwardly, no longer caring who heard him, and pressed his palm against his forehead.

"_Please_ stop doing that, Colin."

He realized how little sense it made only after he'd said it.

"What?" Colin returned with a tint of eagerness in his voice, as he shifted just the tiniest bit closer.

The little flare of pain at the voices arising in his mind died away, and Arthur, for the first time in years, found himself actually wanting to cry at his own infuriating helplessness.

"Arthur."

The gentle fingers touched him again, wrapping around his wrist tentatively and pulling his hand away from his eyes.

Once, it would probably have annoyed him to have someone—especially _Col_in—touch him like that; this time, however, he only wearily blinked up at him.

And when he saw the beseeching light in Colin's eyes, something deep inside him seemed to protest his silence loudly enough so that he could no longer struggle with his doubts.

"You'll think I'm insane," he told him truthfully, barely a murmur as the wind raged outside.

He was almost surprised that Colin seemed actually to relax at his fierceness and the conviction of his statement; the boy's eyes softened, and he chuckled just a little as his hand fell away from Arthur's wrist.

"No more than usual," he replied certainly, and Arthur couldn't help but get the feeling that there was more history behind that fair face than he knew. "Try me, Arthur. I would never use it against you; you know that. I'd never tell another soul."

Arthur inhaled deeply, realizing that his headache was fading, and rolled his eyes and hummed with some of his old sarcasm.

"You might change your mind about that," he said as he understood he had made his decision; he was actually going to tell him. Only twice had he ever told anyone of his incredible, wild dreams. The first was his old nanny, when he was but a child, and she had dismissed the notion of the dreams' reality with a wave of her hand and a cluck about Arthur's overly active imagination; the second had been Kate, and she had believed him to be drunk at the time.

This was different from either of those times.

It surprised him once more when all the humor was chased away from Colin's countenance and was replaced with something more solemn, his eyes gazing into the young Gregory's with something Arthur could not quite grasp.

"I won't," he said, and his voice sounded lighter than the vow actually was. "I won't tell anyone, sir, not if you don't want me to. I just want you to trust me."

Those words struck Arthur strangely, and many questions arose, the theme of all of them the same. Why? Why did Colin want that?

He didn't dwell upon these questions, for he felt as though deep down he somehow knew the answer, even if his mind couldn't quite comprehend it yet.

He opened his mouth to speak, and then he recalled how utterly ridiculous it was going to sound; he couldn't stop a small chortle at himself as he rubbed his hand over his chin with a nervousness that was extremely rare for him.

Colin was watching him with some slight humor written upon his contoured face, his eyes locking upon Arthur's every shift in expression as if there were a thousand stories to be read in each one.

Arthur inhaled again, and he didn't feel so frightened over it now that his headache was gone and he had nothing to remind him of the degree of seriousness he faced.

"I have strange dreams."

Merlin held his breath as the words were whispered between them. Arthur would not lift his eyes, continuing to stare down into his hands, but the warlock could hear it in his strong, ancient voice. There was trust. He was trusting Colin in exactly the same way he'd trusted Merlin; after the months it had taken for their friendship to grow quicker and deeper than it had the first time, Arthur was letting him inside, and perhaps now, finally, Merlin's magic could rescue his lost king from the troubled and doubtful states of his mind and heart. Perhaps this was the moment he would see Arthur realize his place—_their_ destiny.

Merlin held himself as still and quiet as the Lake of Avalon in the night, watching at listening to his king with all he had, just as he'd always done.

"I know they're not real." Arthur looked up at him now, his eyes earnest and anxious for his friend to believe him. "I know that they're just...dreams."

Merlin remained silent as his friend stumbled for the correct word.

"But," Arthur went on, even more slowly now, as he carded his fingers through his hair again, "there are times when it feels as though they _are_ real."

"When you're sleeping?" Merlin asked, meaning it as a tiny encouragement but not without curiosity.

"No—well, yes, then, of course." He sighed. "But not just then. Sometimes, they feel real even when I'm awake."

Merlin's heartbeat accelerated in his chest.

"I feel like..." the other man trailed off, rubbing his forehead as his headache softly returned. "There are times when I feel as though I've been to the places I see in the dreams, and I...know the people, somehow, though I've never seen any of them in the real world."

Arthur chuckled as he said the last few words.

"None of them?" Merlin questioned, because he had to ask; he had to understand exactly what his friend was seeing.

Arthur looked to him and remained quiet for a long minute, as though deciding whether to say his next words or not.

"There is one," he said, slowly, as he looked away to the floor again. "In the dreams, I'm…"

"What?" he whispered in gentle urging, for he thought he could predict what his Arthur would say next, but he had to be certain.

"I know it sounds mad," he said, instead of finishing, and he sounded so very tired. "But ever since I was a child, I've dreamt that I'm..."

Merlin did not speak again, but his silence served well enough to ease Arthur on.

"I'm King Arthur." Punctuated by a semi-hysterical laugh.

Merlin released a breath he did not realize he'd been holding, and though there were a thousand things he could have said, and wanted to say, he remained silent as he waited for his greatest friend to continue with his story.

"In the dreams, I live in Camelot, but it changes. Sometimes, I'm young, and sometimes, I'm old. In the most important parts, I'm in the midst of my reign, and I have Guinevere for my wife, and knights as my loyal friends, and a warlock—Merlin. He's not an old man, though; he's…young, and impudent, and he's…"

Merlin nearly had to bite his tongue to stop himself from verbally encouraging the other man had possibly breaking the concentration that had settled upon him as he thought of his wondrous dreams.

"…he seems just like—" It was this moment that the young Gregory realized what he was saying, and he ran his hand down the side of his face, a faint blush coloring his golden skin.

"He's what, Arthur?" Merlin could hold himself back no more, for if he could get Arthur to admit it, to say it aloud that Colin and Merlin were one and the same in his mind, it could be his door to open Arthur to his true past and their true significance.

But Arthur only shook his head, refusing to say it aloud for fear of Colin's opinion of his sanity.

Merlin forced himself to relax, seeing that he was not to hear any more of the warlock of Arthur's dreams; he felt his friend's riling emotions, his ancient, royal soul battling his modern, skeptical mind, and the old warlock made his choice; he'd been forced to wait so many long and hard years in secret before his prince and later his king. He had no such restrictions upon him now—no laws to burn him alive for what truths he had to tell. He could not let himself fear Arthur's rejection, for how could the gods have brought him so far only to have Arthur turn him away?

With that, he made his decision to speak—to no longer be silent.

"Arthur."

Merlin shifted closer so that his knee nearly touched his friend's; his hands desired to reach out and touch his king's shoulder, but he held them still for the knowledge of the other man's disfavor of such sentiments.

Arthur raised his head at the quiet solemnity of his friend's voice, and his royal-blue eyes were filled with distress which made Merlin's heart, though so old and timeworn, ache for him. A young man as purely good as Arthur should never bear such an expression, especially for such a reason as this.

"Is there something wrong with me, Colin?"

At that, Merlin's heart broke completely, and he knew he could not bear the weight of his secret any longer.

"There is nothing wrong with you, Arthur," he told him earnestly, and he could not keep himself from taking hold of his friend's wrist, feeling the tiny trickle of magic in the man's veins which Arthur himself could not feel.

"How can you be so sure?" The question rang with a lingering undertone of desperation as Arthur's eyes continued to plead for some sort of solid reassurance.

"It's _true_." Merlin did not attempt to hide the intensity from his gaze now; Arthur needed to know him for who he was, needed to _see_ him.

"I feel insane, Colin," he said, frankly and with a certain degree of hilarity, as he once again ran his palm against his throbbing head.

"You're not," Merlin answered, leaning down closer so that he could look into Arthur's eyes without the man having to raise his aching head. "You're not insane, sir." He smiled. "You're special."

"Thanks so much, _Col_in. That helps."

Merlin gave no answer to that, but regarded his once-king with wondering eyes as the rain continued to pound.

"You really have no idea how special you are, do you?"

He did not mean for it to slip out so candidly, but Merlin simply could not comprehend that here, King Arthur of Camelot, the Once and Future King of Albion, truly did not know who he was and had no notion of the greatness that was within him. Merlin had a thousand events cataloged within his memory—all those moments he'd watched Arthur Pendragon conquer foes (both physical and not) that no other man in all the world dared even face. Arthur Gregory was capable of the same, and perhaps even more so if he would only remember the wisdom he had acquired from those years of his first life, and yet he sat before his warlock trembling from the magic inside him that was desperately trying to break free and lost in his own self-enforced blindness to it.

In a strange way, it made Merlin want to hide his young king away from the world until he could regain his strength to withstand all the pressures and dangers that were thrown at him. He almost considered doing just that, until he remembered that Morgana could trace Arthur no matter how deeply in the Isle of the Blessed he hid him, and anyway, Arthur—once he was completely _Arthur_ again—would not be pleased with having been whisked away like a damsel in distress, and certainly not when there was yet evil to vanquish.

For once, Arthur seemed unable to form a response to him; he was watching him, though, his conflicted blue eyes half-distinguished with that same affliction and half with a new sort of confused surprise at Colin's whispered thought.

Merlin looked down to where his hand remained solidly upon the arm of his friend. He thought of the ring on the chain, hidden beneath the gray shirt he was wearing. He looked up once more.

"Arthur—"

The man blinked at him and glanced quickly down at his hand, as though just realizing his assistant was touching him.

"—my friend—"

Arthur's attentions instantly rose again at that, and that light of surprise returned on his face even as he wondered how such an old-fashioned term sounded so natural and almost soothing.

"—there is something I need to tell you." Merlin's fingers tightened just the slightest bit around Arthur's wrist, and he rephrased. "There's something you've _got _to know."

"What is it, Colin?" he returned, rather lost in the otherworldly, shifting blues and greens of Colin's eyes; whatever it was he had to say, Arthur needed to hear it; he wasn't sure how he knew this, but he did.

Colin looked away then, biting down on his lower lip as though in contemplation of how he would voice his thoughts, but looked back at him again after only a few moments.

"I'm going to explain," he said, and the way he spoke reminded Arthur oddly of an uplifting doctor or of a wise minister in a cathedral…or perhaps Colin was simply both. "I'll explain everything I can to you, Arthur. You must promise me that you'll listen and hear me out, no matter what you think."

Arthur suddenly felt the familiar throbbing ache start to form at the back of his head, but he pressed his left hand firmly over it as though to stifle it and said, with a sure nod of permission,

"I'm listening, Col. What is it?"

Merlin was silent for one more heartbeat, and then,

"I want to tell you about Camelot."

**To be continued  
(in Part v)**

* * *

(1) The Crystal Cave (Episode 5, Season 3), beginning at 11:25.

(2) 9-4-9-2-7-3: w-i-z-a-r-d

(3) The Wicked Day (Episode 3, Season 4), beginning at 41:22.

(4) This is not a scene from any of the episodes, but the wooden dragon comes from The Last Dragonlord (Episode 13, Season 2), at 32:35.

(5) Le Morte d'Arthur (Episode 13, Season 1), beginning at 32:45.

(6) The Darkest Hour, Part 2 (Episode 2, Season 4), beginning at 31:08.

(7) Inspired by this artwork: post/416309855/show-me-your-magic-by-tplayer. (I hope it shows up; fanfiction is screwy about outgoing links. *eyeroll* If you can't search it and you want to see it, just message me.)

(8) Reference to Le Morte d'Arthur (Episode 13, Season 1).

(9) Valiant (Episode 2, Season 1), beginning at 44:41. (Yeesh. This part has a lot of footnotes!)

* * *

_Sooooo Morgana has implanted sickening black magic inside poor naïve Arthur Gregory, Arthur is obsessing over his mental sanity because he refuses to admit that he is the King (not Elvis), and Merlin is three seconds away from the moment for which he's been waiting for practically 1,533 years.  
What could possibly go wrong? Find out next Friday! (And I've also been listening to too many radio shows lately. Forgive me.)  
Songs for this Part (and the previous ones may still apply):  
Little Wonders by Rob Thomas (I love this song!)  
By Your Side by Lifehouse  
Take me Away by Lifehouse  
King and Lionheart by Of Monsters and Men (thank you, Ocean Mint Leaves)  
Til Kingdom Come by Coldplay  
When You Find Me by Joshua Radin  
Merlin and I wanted his words to Arthur to be clear to you: There's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it. And now, Arthur also has words of wisdom for you: You're always better than you give yourself credit for. Remember that. ;)  
Addio!_


	5. Missing Footnote

Before you think it, no, this isn't yet Part 5. (Sorry!) I just realized that I totally forgot to give you a link in the footnotes of Part 4 for the picture of Merlin's new sneakers mentioned toward the beginning of the chapter. I had fun designing these, just for our favorite little warlock (of course Arthur helped, but he's really not that good at fashion designing, poor kid).  
In front of what's below, put (minus spaces *and* parentheses) h (t) t (p) : (/) / (w) w (w) . (c) o (n) v (e) r (s) e . c (o) m

If the link still doesn't work because of stupid fanfiction, just PM me and I'll send it to you. Sorry for the false update alarm! I still love you.

#/products/shoes/converseone/builder/chuTaySkiCVO1101,,,412141069


	6. Part v

_So you might like to know that the reason I'm updating so late/early in the morning is because I spent my day sorting through my room. Senior year in high school, gotta have a newly-organized room and all, especially given that it hasn't been properly dusted in three years.  
All I can say is wow—I never knew I had so much utter crap. Or such treasures. Or SO MUCH DUST.  
Anyway, I'm sure you all don't want to know about my adventures in cleanliness today, so allow me to just thank everyone who's read (and reviewed) so far. You are all wonderful people who make a bored seventeen-year-old's life slightly glittery.  
It's four in the morning here. I don't know what I'm saying anymore.  
Enjoy Part 5!_

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Part v**

Merlin never had the chance to tell Arthur that night. Even before he had finished speaking, a clatter of thunder accompanied by a white-purple flash of lightning overtook his voice, the noise blending in a piercing duet with the strident ringing of Arthur's mobile phone on the escritoire behind the sofa where they sat together.

Arthur never even heard his words.

The spell was broken between them as the young CEO, who had so hastily become much more alert about taking calls and messages since his promotion, stood instinctively and reached for his mobile. He had answered it even before the rolls of thunder had faded away into the drumming rain, leaving Merlin sitting on the other side of the sofa, mind reeling with how close he had been to telling him.

The warlock's shoulders dropped with his acute disappointment as Arthur began to converse with the caller, but he never objected or even spoke as he saw his friend's handsome face darken with whatever was being said in his ear. He felt his heart slow, the depth of tension and anxiousness draining from him as his chance was lost in the distracting noise of the heavy rainfall against the windows.

From the way Arthur suddenly met his eyes, Merlin understood without words that the caller was most likely Detective-Inspector Walker, who was over the case of Anthony Gregory's murder. Arthur kept his gaze locked upon his assistant's; the deep blue eyes now held an entirely different kind of solemnity, and he spoke only once and said,

"Thank you, sir. I'll be there first thing in the morning...Goodnight."

As Arthur set aside his luxury iPhone, Merlin pushed away his own unhappy thoughts of discouragement and disquiet and focused his attention solely upon his boss's face.

"That was Walker," the young man confirmed, crossing his strong arms over his chest thoughtfully as he leaned against the back of the sofa, and Merlin did not miss the way his voice still trembled just slightly. "He says that he may have a lead."

Merlin's eyes narrowed at that, and at the same time, he felt a twinge of hope low in his chest; if it were true, and somehow they discovered Morgana's guilt, perhaps he could find his way to telling Arthur without so much doubt and unbelief clouding the man's mind against it.

"What is it?" he asked, concealing the little excitement from his voice.

"I don't know," Arthur answered lowly. "He said he wants me to come down to the police station tomorrow morning; he needs my opinion on it."

"I'll come with you," the warlock volunteered without hesitating.

"No," the other man said firmly, as he pushed away from the couch and circled it to retake his seat beside his secretary. "I need you to go to the bank office tomorrow and transfer all of the documents from my father's computer to mine. We need to concentrate on running the companies, just as he would."

"All right," Merlin consented; though his first reaction was to argue his way to tagging along, he took note of the deep circles beneath his friend's eyes and promptly decided against it. "What's his password?"

"I don't know," the young CEO answered honestly, resting his head on his hand. "Father never let anyone into his computer. It was crucial that everything in it was kept safe."

"Well, how am I supposed to get into it, then?" he asked, though it was rather pointless to do so when he more or less already knew the answer.

Arthur did not pause in consideration before he replied.

"I'm sure you'll figure it out, Col." This he said with a fond ruffle to his dark hair, which had, since the first day Merlin had arrived in his chambers as his manservant, been a combination apology/reward when the then-prince had thrust some task upon him which was rather unfair.

Merlin thought himself rather boyish again when he discovered this affectionate gesture still made him forgive any of Arthur's little offenses.

"Right," he said, and didn't bother patting his hair down again when he saw that Arthur was once more running his hand along the side of his face and wincing just barely. "Are you all right?"

Arthur glanced up at him and nodded.

"My head hurts," he said with a quiet sigh. "I think I'm just tired, that's all."

With that, Merlin gave up all expectations that they would return to their conversation. Instead, he stood and went to the kitchen, past the table full of food which had long-since gone cold. He opened the thin door of the small cabinet he had built with his own hands in Yemen many years before; it hung on the fragment of wall which was to the right of the low sink and served to hold vials of medicine which Merlin mixed with his magic. Now he chose one in particular for his friend, taking it down and sliding it into a fitted pouch to keep it safe from the metal keys which Arthur kept in his trouser pocket.

"Drink half of this now, and half in ten minutes," he told him when he returned to where Arthur sat, putting it into his hand and turning back to the kitchen with the certainty that the other man would accept it gratefully.

When the bottle was emptied and Arthur's headache already beginning to fade, Colin returned to the sitting room with a large platter full of a helping of each food type they had made in the hour they'd spent cooking.

"Do you want me to carry these upstairs for you?"

Arthur could not keep himself from smiling, for he could clearly hear the gentle concern underlying the inquest. He did not understand it, but he knew beyond doubt that it was there.

"No," he answered, and took it from him. "Thank you, Colin."

The man smiled in answer—an easy, friendly smile which made Arthur feel, for just a moment, as though if no one else in the world truly cared for him, at least one man always would.

"Do you want me to give you something to help you sleep?" Colin asked as he followed him to the door.

"I'll be okay," Arthur answered, suddenly feeling the exhaustion creep over his muscles and make his eyelids feel heavy, as though kindled by the suggestion. "Thanks anyway."

"Goodnight, sir."

He glanced behind him as he stepped out into the carpeted hall, nodding at his dark-haired friend where he leant against his door and bade him farewell.

"'Night, Col. Don't be late tomorrow; I'll be there later."

"Yes, sir."

He ignored the mock salute that accompanied the smart retort, and wondered why it warmed him so when he saw Colin didn't move from the doorway until he saw Arthur safely in the lift.

Inside the flat, Merlin closed the sturdy door and leant his head back against it with a long sigh, followed by a brief huff through his nostrils as he wryly accepted what had occurred. He touched the ring through his shirt and remembered the near-decade that went by before he had the chance to be free in the first life. He had believed, during those years as manservant, that he would never be known by his king for who he was; then, when he least expected it, by destiny's decree as reward for his patience he _was_ set free. His name was known all across the earth even to the day for his legacy.

Merlin knew that he could not give up; he had to retain his faith. His time _would _come. He and Arthur would live to be King and Warlock once more.

Bearing this thought in mind, he pushed off from the door and stretched with a yawn as his magic cleaned the pots.

* * *

_I'm sorry to bother you. I know you're busy. The wench in the box keeps telling me that I have to answer a security question._

Where he sat awaiting Detective-Inspector Walker's call for him, Arthur could not stop a wary smile, despite his nerves, as he read the message which had appeared on the screen of his mobile. Count on Colin to find a way to cheer him up even in a place like this, and even when he wasn't with him.

(Both the banks and the weapons manufacturing agencies belonging to the Gregorys updated their technology every time a more suitable system reached the market. This latest came equipped with a surprisingly witty, female "motherboard" present and available on-screen whenever she was summoned by any one of the many computers' users. "She" had irritated Colin to no end since the day of her arrival.)

_What is it?_

The mobile vibrated less than a minute later. (Colin had been absolutely terrible at using the touchscreen at first, taking over three minutes to compose a readable two-sentence text message. He was a fast learner, though, much to Arthur's relief.)

_The name of his birthplace?_

Arthur rolled his eyes despite the solemnity of where he was.

_London. It's on Wikipedia, for gods sakes. Idiot._

"Mr. Gregory, Detective-Inspector Walker wants to see you in his office now."

He stood at the sound of the evidently flustered, ruddy-faced secretary's summons, and all else—even his ridiculously endearing secretary—was driven from his mind by the thought of finding a clue to his father's killer.

Deep inside his restless spirit, the good magic which made him was beginning to wane against the unending blackness of Morgana's lies.

* * *

Merlin was half-tempted to answer back, _I tried that already. Prat_. However, he knew it would be soon that the detective-inspector would call for his friend to observe the latest evidence in the case, and Arthur's mind was already so troubled and still wracked by Anthony's death and the anonymity of the murderer that he did not want to add to that concern even with a stupidly difficult passkey (and its even more stupidly difficult "guardian," who was presently blinking at him with her twitching, animated blue eyes from the left corner of the monitor).

Instead, Merlin deleted the reply half-typed and tossed his mobile down on the desk where he sat. He fell heavily against the back of the padded leather chair, slouching down rather pathetically as he drummed his fingers on the armrest and tried to fathom out what the slightly devious Uther-counterpart could have had for a complicated password under the hint, _"Where were you born?"_ if it wasn't actually _where he was born_.

Merlin scratched his head, mussing up his hair, patted it back down, fumbled with a loose string on his sleeve for about thirty seconds, and then sat up only a bit straighter in the seat.

"_Manchester"_

It was this Arthur's birthplace, as well as the first location of Camelot Banks.

"Incorrect," twittered the wench in the box.

Merlin narrowed his eyes at her vexingly. Of course, she did not grace him with a response.

"_Bristol"_

This was the birthplace of Arthur's deceased mother, Anthony's only wife.

"Incorrect," the wench repeated, and he would have sworn upon his very magic that she sounded more smug every time.

"You aren't helping," he told her.

"One hint available," she answered, her voice pausing and fluctuating in that particular way mechanical voices do. "Chosen security question: Where were you born?"

Merlin had never been fond of technology, and he'd learnt the hard way that using his natural magic on this sort of thing only made the computer tear itself apart with the notion that the spell was running along its system was a type of unknown virus, or something or other. He had a look from suspicious Spanish neighbors on his brain to remind him thoroughly of what happened to the first (and only) computer Merlin had ever had in his possession; evidently, no one in that particular village in southern Spain had ever before seen a man tossing out a smoking and sparking lump of metal and plastic while muttering curses in Latin.

In any case, the way Mrs. Osprey's beady eyes were watching him through the glass wall as she typed at her own desktop made him almost afraid to try.

Just as he was about to give up and call an engineer, his eyes caught sight of a stone paperweight sitting at the corner of the desk. It was dark as charcoal in color, circular in shape, settled into a rotating circle of metal attached to a base so that it could swivel and every inch of it could be viewed. It looked like nothing more precious than a common paperweight—and a dull one at that, not new or polished like other items in the grand office; it could have come from any shop, anywhere. It was not special in any way…

…except that it was, for as he leant closer, he saw familiar, ancient runes etched all around the rock's surface, and he could read every letter of his worldly-forgotten language.

_EMRYS_

He picked it up, for he had seen this object dozens of times when he'd been standing in this office and never before had he looked for his name upon it. When his skin touched the rough stone, it crackled and fell to sand in his palm.

Within, there was a rolled message:

_I do not know what you will be calling yourself by the time you read this, if you ever do. Long ago, I knew you as Merlin, and that is who I shall be remembering as I write this._

_I know who my son is. When he was born, my wife and I called him Arthur. I understand now that was not our choice; his name has always been Arthur. I know why he is here, and I know that the reason is something that no one besides he could undertake._

_I shall not go into the details of explaining to you how I know all of these things. I am sure that, if you have not discovered how already, you will soon enough._

_I write this message because I do not know what will become of me. Uther Pendragon is certainly a part of me; surely you will not think I am insane if I tell you I can recall his life in my mind at times. He had to die before his son could rise to his destiny. Perhaps it will be the same for me, someday, when Arthur is old enough to bear it._

_In any case, if I do not get the chance to address you, whether because I never meet you in this lifetime or because I do not think Arthur should become caught in the middle of our secret, there are but two things I must tell you, on behalf firstly of Uther, and secondly of myself, whether I am him or not._

_I am sorry for the wrongs that occurred then. I—Uther—had his heart hardened by his grief; such a thing is difficult to escape except by blaming others. In his power and his sadness, Uther blamed everyone but a precious few. He knows now how wrong he was. He knows all of the good you did, and he wishes to thank you, and begs your forgiveness._

_For me, I have only one, small thing to ask of you. I understand it is a futile request. I have no doubt that you will fulfill it no matter who tries to encourage or destroy the task. As I watch him sleeping across the room, I feel that I must ask, nevertheless. Merlin, take care of him._

_Anthony Gregory  
April 5, 1995_

Merlin looked up from the letter. With shaking fingers, he let go of the seventeen-year-old note with one hand and reached toward the keyboard of the desktop.

"_Bourges"_ (1)

The screen flashed.

"Welcome back, Mr. Gregory."

* * *

"You have more news about my father's death?"

Arthur's words had spilled out in contained agitation even before Detective-Inspector Walker could voice a greeting to him. The inspector, tall and black-haired with an air of serious compassion and a tinge of biting humor, turned to face the newcomer as Arthur closed the door behind himself.

"I warned you on the telephone yesterday, Mr. Gregory," said he with a degree of firmness but not without mercy, "it could be that this is not a discovery of any importance. It's very likely that it is nothing more than a slight oversight."

Arthur inhaled deeply, bridling his own impatience and remembering Colin's words from the luncheon the day before. He repeated them in his mind; he could not bring back his father. He could only try to remain calm and steady-minded over his death.

"I understand, sir," said he with considerably more professionalism than he felt, though he never sat down in the chair which the other man waved him toward.

"There was," said Walker, circling around his oak desk to open one of the narrow drawers, "one item found in your father's apartment which was unlisted amongst his belongings."

Arthur could not stop himself from leaning forward as the man pulled from the drawer a clear, plastic bag which was really much too large for the tiny object inside it.

"Can you tell me if you recognize this, Mr. Gregory?"

Arthur took the bag as it was passed to him, and it was easy to ignore the heavy gaze of the detective when he held it up to his eyes and observed what was within.

He felt his blood run cold.

It was Colin's ring.

* * *

Merlin let out a small sigh and sat back in the chair as he waited for the files he'd highlighted on the desktop of Anthony Gregory's monitor to transfer to the flash drive given him by Arthur. As the tiny beeps which indicated the computer's doing its work filled the light silence of the now-unoccupied office, his eyes flickered once more to the message to him from Anthony.

His eyes again took in the words and the amazing truths they entailed. Anthony had known him. Right from the very start, he had recognized him for who he was, only never speaking of this knowledge for Arthur's sake. It was rather astounding (and Merlin had lived so long that nearly nothing astounded him anymore). He had asked his forgiveness; everything from Uther's life was settled forevermore in Merlin's sight and in the sight of the gods.

As he contemplated this with a tiny half-smile of gladness, Merlin's right hand went out of habit to the King's ring which remained always around his throat. His fingers touched the familiar edges through the fabric of his purple shirt.

Then, his attention was cut off from the letter as a stunning realization struck him.

Merlin pulled the chain over his head in a swift motion and held it up in his hand so that he could clearly see the band dangling from it.

The silver ring was old and dinted, but it was not the one he treasured.

* * *

"Does it belong with your father's things, Mr. Gregory?"

It took Arthur a long moment to answer, for his brain seemed to be running entirely too slowly. A headache was beginning to form at the back of his skull, as a conversation started to form in the back of his mind, little whispers at first, Kate's voice, steadily becoming louder and comprehensible as he stood still and allowed it. It felt like a discussion from a dream, or from a long while in the past, but as he recalled Kate's appearance, how her hair was so tangled and her makeup undone, he knew that it was from sometime recent. He knew he had forgotten it until now.

"It's…" he trailed off, and tried to finish, "my assistant's."

Detective-Inspector Walker seemed to be slightly disappointed in this revelation, but he remained ever as outwardly unemotional as a man in his profession was required to be.

"I see," he said lowly, and as he had seen the young Mr. Gregory and his trusted secretary called Colin interacting once with his own eyes, he never once thought to consider the ring as solid evidence condemning the boy. "We did have one of the valets state that he saw young Mr.—James, is it?—entering and exiting the building that day, but he could not remember what time it was. Of course, I did tell you that before, and you assured me that Mr. James was with you for nearly all of the day of your father's murder and that he is most definitely innocent. Perhaps he left his ring there at another time, then."

Had Walker's back not been turned to the younger man as he placed a file into the cabinet behind his desk, his keen eyes might have seen how Arthur's face flickered with new indecision which was exactly the opposite of the surety he'd possessed when the question of Colin's possible guilt had briefly arisen.

"In any case, however," Walker went on without knowing, "you may take the ring with you, and I do apologize for what inconvenience this has caused."

Walker narrowed his eyes in some vague concern as Arthur removed the ring from the bag with trembling hands, dropped it back down onto the desk before him, and promptly pressed one palm against his forehead, his face blanching as he rubbed his fingers against his scalp subtly.

"Mr. Gregory?"

"I'm fine," came the assuring answer, as the blonde man looked up to meet his gaze evenly, pushing the ring and its broken chain into his inner jacket pocket. "Thank you, Lieutenant, for your time."

"You have my assurance that we are doing all we can for you, sir," he replied, and it was not any habit of Detective-Inspector Walker's to refer to another—even an equal, much less a younger man—so respectfully, but something in the dark blue eyes of Arthur Gregory demanded it.

"Thank you," the other responded with a sincerity that was unusual for the world in which they lived, and there were no more words between them as he exited the office.

Arthur scarcely made it into a cab and ordered the driver to take him back to his flat before the onslaught of pain in his head grew nearly blinding. It was as though a dam had broken within his mind, and suddenly, every word of Kate's confession to him—about her terrible discoveries, about Mordecai Shultz, about Colin's revenge and treachery toward his father—came flooding back to him all in an instant.

He sat in the back of the taxi with his forehead in his hand and the ring in his inside pocket feeling heavier than any burden he'd ever bore.

* * *

When Merlin entered Arthur's rooms that night, he came entirely prepared with a bowl of steaming soup in one hand and a stack of '80s adventure movies balanced in the other. When he saw that his master stood far across the darkened place, his back turned so that his silhouette stood out against the large glass wall into London and the still-stormy evening sky, he used his magic to shut the door and lock it.

He knew Arthur really must not have been feeling well, just as he'd said when he'd called the office that afternoon after his visit to the station, because the young man never turned around to greet him, though Merlin made a noticeable amount of noise setting down the clay bowl on the counter and the DVDs on the coffee table in the sitting room.

He stepped quietly to Arthur's side and spoke gently so as not to startle him.

"It's dark in here, sir," he noted. "Would you like for me to turn on a light?"

"No," came the equally quiet answer, and Arthur's voice sounded hoarse and strained, just as it had on the telephone earlier, when he'd given some pitiful excuse as to why he needed Colin to cover for him one more day.

Merlin's stomach knotted in exactly the same way it had when he'd heard it then. There was something wrong. Something had happened today that made his king's voice that way, and the sound of it made the old warlock want to incinerate whatever it was as quickly as possible.

"What's the matter, Arthur?" he pressed, nearly a whisper in the silence, for some deep dread was forming inside the warlock, though he knew not from where it came, or why. His magic was so linked with Arthur's soul that he could feel each shift of the young man's emotions, and his own feelings never failed to react in like form to whatever Arthur needed. Now, there was a strange, dark sensation in his heart, and he found himself unable to read exactly what it meant, for it was something he had never felt before, even in all their years in Camelot.

There was another long moment of silence, and Arthur never once turned to look at him, but Merlin could see his slight trembling all down his muscular body and knew that the pain in his head had returned again—badly, it seemed, for when the man finally did turn, he was pale as the moonlight disappearing and reappearing behind the dark clouds outside the window, and there were tiny beads of sweat on his brow from a fever.

Something was wrong. Before Merlin could reach out to touch his friend, however, Arthur spoke.

"Tell me you have a good reason for this, Colin."

"What?" he responded almost without thinking, as he looked into sapphire blue eyes that were sick and pained and strived to discern a reason for the cold feeling creeping steadily up his spine.

Arthur held up his hand, and when Merlin saw that the old band in his palm was his lost and cherished ring, he could not bring himself to feel relieved, for Arthur's hand was shaking almost violently and his breathing slow and controlled in the silence of the dark place.

"Kate told me everything."

Kate. Merlin's breath caught in his throat, his magic jolting within him. _Morgana._ The liar.

"What did she tell you, Arthur?" he asked earnestly, as he began to realize what battle he fought here and now, and the meaning behind the icy sensation in his blood.

"Don't pretend you don't know."

The vicious accusation in Arthur's voice stole Merlin's breath away. Never, in all their years spent together, even when the secrets of magic rose up and came so close to turning Arthur against him forevermore—even then, such fierce, cruel resentment was never so prominent in the king's expressive eyes and dripping from his every syllable. This was the visage of a man whose hard walls of reason could not be broken or reasoned away; Merlin had seen enough of the world to recognize it, though he never had believed he would see it on young Arthur's handsome countenance. There was something more here—something absolutely black and wicked.

The warlock was suddenly terrified.

"I know about your family," Arthur went on, stepping once toward him, and Merlin, who knew his every mood and manner, could see by the tensing of the man's muscles in his arms and shoulders that he was one wrong word away from striking out.

He had never so much as considered striking Merlin in anger—not once.

"My family?" Merlin thought instantly of Gaius, of Hunith, Balinor, but King Arthur had known them; this young Arthur knew them in his dreams; it could not be that Morgana had risked a lie about them to his ears.

"Your father," spat Arthur, as though that were explanation enough.

Merlin took a step back as he moved closer, not because the powerful warlock feared him, but because Arthur was sick—so very, helplessly sick, and his strong and healthy mind was weakened by the endless conflict of who he had been once and who he was now. Merlin's only hope was to do as he had always done for him—to balance his movements and his words with only what was best for his king. If Arthur could not rise from this dark labyrinth in which his noble soul was lost, nothing else would matter.

Nothing else ever mattered to Merlin.

"Kate told me all about you," Arthur went on, and Merlin took one more step back so that only half the moon was visible from the window, but then refused to move any more, keeping his eyes locked upon Arthur's without speaking so that he would know he was not a coward trying to flee whatever accusations "Kate" had invented against him.

"Your name is not James."

Merlin couldn't truly deny this, even if he'd wanted.

"You are a Shultz."

Merlin's blood ran colder. Morgana wouldn't dare….

"What?" he'd gasped even before he knew what he was saying. "Arthur, that's a lie…."

"Then what is this, Colin? _Tell me that_."

He held a handful of documents up in front of Merlin's face, and the warlock took them carefully from him—never too quickly, always gently. His eyes, though sharp and clear, could scarcely see the words on the pages in the shadowed place, but he soon realized that in the pile were pages printed from an Internet page of a driver's license, orphanage records, and, on top of it all, a birth certificate bearing the name Colin Shultz, son of Henry Shultz, born on October 29, 1991.

"She's lying to you," he declared, holding Arthur's icy gaze with the strength and calm which he had always possessed as he set the documents aside so that they were out of both their sights. "You've got to listen to me, Arthur. Please, listen."

Arthur's breathing was labored now, his jaw clenched, and Merlin was terrified more for him than he would ever be for himself. The man's shaking had increased now, his skin sickly gray, and Merlin could nearly feel the heat from his heightened temperature radiating off of his body through his clothes.

"I know what you were going to say," Merlin went on, because he had made his decision, because there was nothing more he could do but tell him the truth now to balance Morgana's lies; his invisible magic pervaded the air, circling protectively around Arthur even though he could not see it, hoping that his spirit would sense it and be enlightened. "Last night, when you spoke of your dreams, of Camelot, I know what you were going to say about Merlin."

Morgana was planning something. It was the only reason she would act now. If Arthur did not understand in this moment, it was conceivable that he never would.

But the mentioning of his dreams did not ease him; rather, Merlin watched as it had the opposite effect, just as he knew it would.

"Shut up, Colin," he snapped. "You never had a reason to be in my father's flat. Explain to me why you were."

"I wasn't! Look—this ring on my chain is not mine. Someone stole mine from me, Arthur; _she_ did, and she's using it against me."

"_Stop lying to me_!"

Merlin pushed out his magic, and he knew it was impossible for Arthur not to see his eyes as they flashed gold inches from his friend's face, but it mattered little now, just so he could get it within Arthur, to calm him and make him see the truth. He had been holding himself back—holding back the immense power that would reveal everything to his king, because he had feared it would hurt his mind with its intensity, especially in recent months, when he had been under such pressure already; now, he realized how foolish he had been to try to protect him. Arthur was suffering anyway; he could see it in the way the man gasped and touched his palm to his head in trying to dispel the image of Colin's golden eyes.

Merlin's magic made it to Arthur and slipped just beneath his skin…

…then, the warlock's head was knocked back as though by a physical blow.

Black magic, the most powerful form of it, had spread from Arthur's overwrought mind, from that little place where Morgana had planted it in her lies, and it had set itself up like a shield against Merlin's good magic. Only an equally powerful enchantment would break through…and Merlin doubted Arthur could bear that, not because his great courage and noble might were any less than they had been, but because his spirit had been so weakened by the internal war. Nothing but Arthur's own strength could dispel it now, if he would just fight against it with the knowledge of _who he was_, Merlin knew he would come out victorious. They always would.

Arthur had not felt Merlin's magic tossed out by the black inside him, but his handsome face had turned grayer than it had been before at the golden flash in Colin's gaze.

"Listen to me," Merlin lowered his voice until it was gentle and slow so that it would not betray his trepidation, stepping forward with his hands held up so that his friend would see that he held nothing against him. "I know that you are lost and scared.—"

Arthur cried out as an assailment of pain flared up in the back of his head, cutting off whatever his secretary was to say next.

…"_You're not going back, then."_

"_I think I'll tag along. Don't want you getting lost and scared."… _(2)

Arthur coughed harshly as the pain subsided to a thrumming. He blinked rapidly and found himself looking down at the midnight black of Colin's shirt where his head was bent against the other man's shoulder. His fingers tightened spasmodically around his assistant's lean biceps, for he had obviously gripped Colin's arms as he had lost his balance. He coughed again, struggling to catch his breath, and he could feel Colin holding his arms as well, helping keep him balanced like a solid assurance in the dark room.

"It's okay," he could hear him whispering. "It's going to be all right, Arthur. You must calm down."

It was then that Arthur realized what he was doing. He pushed away from Colin as violently as he could manage, and ignored it when he immediately felt out of balance again.

"Tell me you did not kill my father."

Colin never moved his gaze away, and Arthur could feel the depth as they looked directly into each other's eyes.

"I did not kill Anthony Gregory, Arthur," finally the answer came, low and intense. "I did not kill him any more than I killed Uther Pendragon."

Arthur found his breath was inexplicably stolen at this statement which he did not understand. Then, another wave of pain, though this was considerably more dull and subtle than the first, and the voice of a gentle physician who was familiar to his dreams from the time he was a child prince to well into adulthood as king.

…"_The sorcerer did not kill your father. Uther was dying. He tried everything in his power to save him."… _(3)

He lifted his head once more to see Colin watching him; there was no surprise in his face from Arthur's reeling, but only a sympathetic sort of intensity as he watched.

Arthur suddenly realized that he could not form any more words, as though his heart were waiting in expectancy for what Colin would say next.

"I know about your dreams, Arthur."

Said with such strength and authority beyond that of a normal man that Arthur could not stop his mind from associating the very tone of it with the warlock in his imagination.

Colin remained steady in watching him, and Arthur, for the dimness of his rooms, saw a flash of a young, new court sorcerer in his mind, of Merlin's dark cloak and passionate eyes, before Colin's form returned before him.

Then, he recalled why they were here, his father's death and the one guilty for it, and his eyes hardened against whatever visions danced around in his mind.

"You don't have to be afraid." Colin's eyes were bright and tender as he said it, his voice so soft and slightly hoarse that Arthur wondered if he were sick as well. "Everything is going to be all right, my friend."

"You keep calling me that," he said, and he was almost too weary to remember to sound hateful.

Colin appeared momentarily surprised at Arthur's tired statement, his head tilting just barely at him.

"That's because it's true, Arthur," said he with just the right amount of sternness, and then, almost comically, in an exhale, "You have no idea."

"I don't understand." He did not mean to say it aloud, but it came out in a scarcely-audible murmur nonetheless.

"I know," came the gentle assurance, as Colin leant just the littlest bit closer. "I know you don't, Arthur. I'll tell you. Just listen, all right? For once in your life, just listen."

…"_Merlin, I'm really not interested in your favorite bedtime stories."_

"_For once in your life, just listen."_… (4)

Nausea rolled his stomach, but he refused to let himself be sick despite the agonizing throbbing in his head, and so Arthur latched onto the sound of the other's voice as he spoke quietly and fiercely into the dark around them.

"You said, Arthur—you told me that you felt as though you've been to the Camelot in your dreams, and you've seen the men and women there."

Merlin doggedly continued, ignoring it when Arthur started to shake his head either out of anger or disregard for what his friend was saying. The warlock just barely refrained from grasping his king's arms in an attempt to get him to reach past all the blind anger and helplessness brought on my Morgana's black magic; instead, he forced his voice to remain soft and controlled, though he could not stop the electric passion underlying his tone as he thought that _here, finally, after so many endless, lonely decades_.

"You have been."

Arthur, who had turned his gaze to the shadow-blackened wall and away from Colin's intense eyes, stopped breathing for a half-moment and inherently looked back to him. At those three, so simple words, his sapphire-blue eyes were wide, the illness ravaging him briefly forgotten. Merlin did not give him time to question, however.

"I can prove it," the warlock went on, never even daring to blink for fear of losing him, as he moved ever-so-slightly closer in his fervor. "I know what you were going to tell me."

Arthur blinked rapidly as he tried to absorb all of what his bright-eyed, mysterious secretary was telling him, but just as Merlin intended, his mind never quite caught up quickly enough for him to interrupt the flow of words.

"About Merlin."

At that, he once again locked gazes with the other man, and inexplicably a strange sort of calm came over him—the same that always did when he thought of Merlin, as though some part of him believed that the wizard was out there, somewhere, protecting him, just as he tenaciously protected King Arthur in his dream-world. His angel.

"I know there is nothing wrong with you, Arthur," he went on, and he could not help that his voice had picked up the tiniest volume and alacrity; his very magic was anxious for this moment. "I know that you're scared that there is, but you don't have to be. You don't _need_ to be."

So much reassurance—Arthur wondered what for.

"I believe you," came the answer to his unspoken question, so sure and unstrained from the mouth of this young man who had so quickly become his best friend…and just as quickly his worst nightmare.

He fought to ignore it as his head spun once more with Kate's words—_"Colin Shultz, he blames your father for his family's falling apart. He's insane. He wants Anthony dead. I found out, and he said he'd kill me if I didn't quit and never speak to you again. Arthur, he's not your friend. You can't trust him. Colin is a monster."_

But somehow, the words didn't sting his consciousness like they did before; the memory of them was not powerful enough to make him lose his focus upon Colin's words now.

"I believe you," the man repeated, his face so milky and innocent in the bare moonlight that Arthur could not imagine a monster lay behind it, "when you say that you feel as though they are real."

Arthur wanted to shake his head once more, to cut this off before it went too far, but he found that he was simply too sick and too overcome with so many emotions to speak over the earnest voice.

"They say," Colin changed his train of thought again, leaving him unable to efficiently keep up once more, "that he is the Once and Future King."

Those words—that name—_so familiar_….

"The legend said that he would return," Colin continued, and there was a whisper of reverence low in his tone, as though he believed every word, "to save Albion again. And his warlock—"

For the first time, Colin's voice choked off, and suddenly, Arthur realized that his pale eyes were glimmering as though with tears he had not been shedding for an eternity.

"—Merlin—"

As thought prompted by the name itself, a spike of pain stabbed the back of his neck, and abruptly he recalled where he was, and why they were here.

"—he was left here.—"

"Colin," he finally summoned the strength enough to break through his assistant's speaking, and along with another flare of that dark, strange pain came his dormant temper, "that's enough."

"—He was left here all these thousand years since then, to wait for Arthur to come back to him.—"

"_Stop it_!" he hissed, and he could feel his face twisting in a great rage as he thought of Mordecai Shultz, and his pathetic son, and the vengeful, delusional grandchild called Colin.

"—And I know all of this." Merlin was so close to him now, so close that he could see every fleck of blue in his Arthur's eyes…_his Arthur_…."I know it because _I am him_, Arthur."

Arthur felt a burning behind his eyes, and his breath was stolen from his lungs. All at once, visions tried to fight their way into his consciousness—dark hair, pale eyes, a ridiculous smile, a ragged scarf replaced eventually by a majestic cloak, an orb of magic, good magic, _trustworthy _magic.

"You know it's the truth," the hard words, not angry, just strong, retaliated as though Colin's eyes—_Colin's? Merlin's?_—could see straight through him to the ghosts which haunted his mind. "_Arthur, you've got to listen to me. Please—you've got to fight it. You know me; you know who I am._"

Merlin could not refrain himself from touching his king any longer, and so he settled his hand upon Arthur's forearm as he watched the sensations flickering over the other man's handsome face in the glow of the moonlight.

Even through the material of Arthur's white shirt, Morgana's black magic—though fainter due to Arthur's strengthening spirit from Merlin's words—recognized Emrys' touch, and Merlin gasped as he felt it run through Arthur's very veins under his fingertips, as if it were trying to frighten him away.

At its wild rise, Arthur's eyes darkened at his friend.

"_You're insane,_" he said decidedly, pulling his arm away. "_I am not King Arthur; there is no such thing as Camelot. Magic does not exist in this world, Colin! You're a filthy liar, that's all._"

"_If it is all a lie,_" said the warlock, soft and slow, "_then how are you speaking in our language?_"

His heart stopped in his chest. Albion. For the past exchanges, Colin had been speaking the language of Albion. The language of his dreams.

And he had been answering.

Something stirred in his mind, but before he could fully comprehend it, a dark swell of agony tore through him; it was not just his head this time, but his entire body that was engulfed by it, like some horrible disease spreading through his bloodstream. He could scarcely resist crying out, a tiny groan escaping his throat before he cut it off determinedly, but his legs buckled nonetheless, and he fell dizzily to his knees.

"Arthur!"

Then, Colin was on his knees as well, and his cool, smooth hand was touching the side of Arthur's flushed face.

"She's done this to you." The words reached his ears faintly, drifting. "She's trying to stop you from knowing the truth. You broke through walls like these before, sire; remember? You tore down twenty-year-old laws condemning magic because you had faith. You must hold onto that faith again. Do you hear me, Arthur? I did not wait all this time just to lose you now. Have faith."

But he could not listen, not when the roaring in his head was so loud and the anger in his heart so strong—though whether he was truly angry at Colin anymore, whether he entirely believed Colin's guilt anymore, he did not even know. Those last two words—_"have faith"_—stirred another vision in his mind, one of a forest of refuge, and a gleaming sword—an all-powerful sword—stuck fast in solid stone, but that dark pain refused to let it past.

"Get out!" he snapped, lifting his head, and the vicious sound of his own voice might have startled him had he been in his right mind.

Colin's eyes narrowed.

"Arthur, please—"

"I said, _Get out_!"

Before he could even realize what he was doing, Arthur had lashed out; though he was physically weak, his strength was still great, and every piece of it was thrown into the force of his strike.

Colin did not utter a sound, though it doubtlessly hurt him as Arthur's hands—one open, one a closed fist still clutching the damning ring—hurled violently against the man's chest, sending him reeling backwards and striking his head forcefully upon the side table.

Arthur saw the light of pain in his little assistant's eyes, but in the turmoil of his mind, he could not bring himself to feel guilty about it yet, though his every instinct told him he should. He firmly bit down an apology, struggling as he was to catch his own breath while his head continued to throb and his vision blurred.

Merlin sat up carefully so that he was at exact eye-level with Arthur; the back of his head ached a bit where it had hit the corner of the wooden side table, but it was nothing compared to the torture of seeing his good king suffering so undeservedly and knowing he could do nothing.

Morgana's magic twisted inside Arthur's chest; Merlin could see it—_the gods help him_, he could _see_ it like a black pit tearing away at the memories and feelings warring to resurface in the king's heart. It could not destroy him with its own might; Arthur's spirit was too strong and too special to break by its power. It could overwhelm him, though, and it was close to doing so now. That would mean the end for both of them, for if Arthur was destroyed now, so would Merlin be.

"All right," he breathed, and held his hands out defenselessly where he sat on his knees.

The black magic began to wane, to sink back down into its dark hole inside Arthur. The lines of pain in the young man's face started to smooth away, his breathing beginning to even. Arthur would never see the magic like Merlin did, would never hear the sound of it, a vile whisper, coming from inside of him where it had made its home, but Merlin was determined not to let it hurt him any longer now, even if it meant giving up this battle for the time being.

"All right," Merlin said again, his voice low and cold toward the magic, which flitted out of sight completely, satisfied at the sound of his submission to it. "It's all right, Arthur. I'll go."

It pained the warlock to say it; his magic whined a tiny prick in his palms at the notion of leaving their king so sick and hurt, and after just revealing himself to him after so many centuries, but there was no other way. He would have to make Arthur drink his magic by a potion; it was his last hope of ever getting _his_ Arthur back whole. If he could taste it, get the magic which bound them together inside of him where his soul was, perhaps it could kill the curse looming over him.

Merlin pushed himself to his feet, cowering back into the shadows toward the door as Arthur stood as well, his once-sparkling eyes nearly black with so many conflicting emotions, his face suddenly guilt-ridden at what he thought was his own fault for losing his temper so recklessly.

"I'll go," Merlin repeated again, this time just for his friend alone, to ease him. "I don't want to hurt you, Arthur. I would never hurt you."

Something else flickered in the young Gregory's face at that, his eyes softening as he listened to Colin's gentle voice and heard something deeper than a mere denial of killing Anthony. Somehow, whatever he heard in the quiet admission, he trusted it. He did not understand it, but those five words struck him like the first real truth he'd heard in a great while.

"Colin."

In the darkness of his flat, he could vaguely see the lithe shape of the boy turning back around to face him from where he'd been stepping lightly toward the door. He could feel Colin listening with his whole heart in the breathless silence.

"Who are you?"

Arthur did not know from where such a question had come, nor did he know why he felt he was not asking about his secretary's last name, or who his father had been.

Out of the shadows, Colin moved back again into the light, just enough so that Arthur could see his face. He looked no different, his short, dark hair barely brushing over his white forehead, his changeable eyes shining like starlight over his distinctive cheekbones, his too-big, onyx tee-shirt contrasting perfectly with his alabaster skin, but written upon his gentle countenance was a tender look of deep sympathy and…something else which Arthur could not quite comprehend, something he had not seen before…_but perhaps he had_….

A spike of hot pain pricked the back of his neck, cutting off the thought as quickly as it had appeared.

"You don't have to be afraid."

Arthur felt something almost like peace settle upon him at the half-whispered assurance, and he raised his head up again to find Colin looking at him with a smile as sad as a lonely lake and soft as the first light of day.

"I'll take care of it, sire. I promise. I won't break another promise to you."

With that, Colin was gone, his dark silhouette fled out the door of the flat, leaving Arthur to wonder if this last whispered was meant for his ears at all.

_Another promise_.

The young man's head swam again, and he scarcely made it stumbling through his darkened flat to his unmade bed before he had half-fainted from exhaustion, the ancient ring which had started all of this still clutched in his palm as welcomed darkness enveloped him.

* * *

Merlin rarely used a Closed Doors spell, not for any insufficient strength or supply of magic (for he had enough to last him a hundred lifetimes over), but simply because they oftentimes left his stomach flipping somersaults and his muscles stiff from the skipping through time and space. This occasion, however, when he vanished just outside of Arthur's flat and opened his eyes standing in his own, he was far too distracted to feel any of it.

There were moments in his long life when he felt the perfect portrait of those conventional witches and warlocks—as those which were featured by ignorant artists and authors since the eras when magic was finally disappearing from the world, little by little, and taken less and less seriously by those who had never truly seen or felt it. Those witches and warlocks painted by such people dwelt in rotting cottages and stirred things like bat's breath and wolf's howls into bubbling cauldrons, rhyming and cackling beneath their pointed hats while their brooms and black cats peered over their shoulders in interest.

Indeed, as objects began to spiral around him from off every shelf in his rooms, some of it moved by nothing more than the sheer force of his magic's release, he felt like one of those aged wizards in a cartooned scene drawn for no other reason but for the merriment of the audience.

This was not a child's comedy, and Merlin did not use his magic for just anyone's entertainment.

The intensity of the gold in his eyes increased as his enchanted mind took index of every book which was hurdled through the air in the tornado of invisible magic surrounding him. Those which were subsequently slammed into the walls and left where they lay meant nothing to him now, no matter how many hundreds of years old they were or what historical secrets lay within their covers. Only one spell book mattered now—the one which would help Arthur.

He found it after mere seconds, his magic recognizing it as the one for which he hunted as soon as it picked it up from a shelf across the room. It hung in the air before him as all the other items collapsed to the floor, unheeded. His eyes took in each word carefully, for this was a spell he'd never dared to use for trepidation of the possible consequences. But it was the only one potent enough and gentle enough to heal Arthur, and so he would take whatever risks necessary without ever caring about the consequences.

Once he had read it over thrice, he let the five-hundred-year-old leather-bound book fall to the floor at his feet, still open at the page bearing his desired spell.

The light of the full moon—a true source of pure magic of both white and black proportions—served as a steadying force for him, bathing his upturned hands in its glow as he shut his eyes against his surroundings and let his conscious mind reach into the place where his beloved magic dwelt. This was an enchantment which required no words, and so he thought of none, but he felt a cold sweat form on his brow as he twisted his very aura to shape the results.

When he felt the very spirit of his magic present in his hands, he could not bear to keep his eyes closed any longer. The sight which met him was a familiar one—an orb of softly glowing, pale blue light, swirling like a living marble of water, but never before had it been so solid, as though it were as tangible in this world as any living creature, or as a coveted gemstone. Merlin allowed himself to watch it for several heartbeats of time, its shifting light reflecting in his wondering eyes as he did, but then, he inhaled deeply to steel himself, and shut his eyes tightly once more, squinting and clenching his teeth against the pressure suddenly in his chest.

Every electric light on the floor with his flat exploded.

When he opened his eyes a moment later, he found himself bent on the floor, and every candle in the place burned with an eerie pale-blue fire.

He raised his head and pushed himself to his feet again, and then his eyes were even with a tiny glass bottle hovering in the air by its own volition. The orb was gone, fled back inside his soul where it had always abided, but a piece of it—just a tiny shard which he had cut off from himself—remained contained within the conjured bottle. In seconds, it had melted like ice and sparked with flickering lightning before settling down into quiet liquid.

Liquid which was solely his eternal magic.

The bottle fell limply once the liquid had faded to crystal blue, and his hand caught it in instinct.

He released a small breath, feeling suddenly weary, but he could not pull his gaze away from the beautiful elixir which he held in his hand. This graceful, celestial, alluring _being_ he beheld was himself, stripped down to his most elemental form. This was his entire existence—more than just his life. It was his spirit—his very essence.

"You can't really mean to give that to him."

Merlin showed no surprise, for he felt none; he had sensed her the moment she had appeared.

"You don't understand, Morgana," he told her calmly, and when his eyes flickered up from the softly glowing bottle, their light blue depths were filled with nothing but a perpetual sadness for her. "That was always your problem. You never did."

She stepped closer to him, though she still kept her distance; the pale blue candle flames still dancing wildly cast strange shadows across her beautiful face and the long, scarlet dress she wore. So contrary to the last time they had spoken, on that cold island when Merlin's world had been overcome by dark and loneliness and he'd had no defense left against her, Morgana could recognize now. She could hear it in his voice, the strength and passion which came only from having his destiny and purpose in his reach.

They were at an impasse. Neither of their hearts would change from that in which they believed, and their faiths were opposite and collided.

"Your magic," she said, her eyes flashing with loathing for him in answer to his compassion, knowing that she could not win in a battle of words or magic but desiring to fight anyway, now that she had him face-to-face, "is powerful enough to bring the world to its knees. That bottle has enough magic within it to build a kingdom from nothing, or raze a standing one to the ground…and you would give it to _him_."

Merlin said nothing. There was nothing he could say. Anything he had to tell her had already been told, a thousand years before, and he knew that her mind and soul were forever against him.

"He is the son of the man who slaughtered us," she continued, her voice rising in volume and pitch as she spoke. "His blood is tainted with that of a hundred thousand innocent sorcerers. _You saved him_. You saved Uther, and then you saved his son. You stopped me from inheriting the kingdom that was rightfully mine. You betrayed every magic in the land. You stood by him and comforted him and counseled him no matter what both of them had done to us. How could you believe you were the one doing what was right?"

"And what would _you_ have me do?" he challenged, unable to keep silent any longer, as he slid the bottle protectively into the pocket of his ripped jeans, out of her sight. "Raze a kingdom to the ground? Bring the world to its knees? For what, Morgana?"

Morgana stood as still as the moon behind her, doing nothing more than breathing as she listened to the voice of the warlock whom she so despised, her silhouette like a lifeless statue clothed in blood.

"Revenge," Merlin went on in the intonation of a man who had lived twenty lifetimes and become wise for them, "for what happened then? For what one selfish king did in grief? Would you have had me side with you and slaughter the first pure-of-heart Pendragon born in generations because one sorceress granted Uther his desire and he blamed her for it?"

Morgana did not miss the insinuation behind this last. She was a Pendragon before Arthur was.

"You do not understand, Morgana," he repeated with more fervency when she would not answer him. "Your love has been defiled by hatred toward something that none of us could have controlled. You will never win, not like this. You can't."

Her face drained of all anger all in an instant, and in its place formed a smile so sinister and wicked that once she would never have believed it to be herself.

"Do you feel that, Merlin?"

No sooner had the words, dripping with a cruel laughter, escaped her mouth, a jolt of power struck the good warlock in the tips of his fingers. He practically heard it when a glass window shattered in the rooms just above his own, and something mighty sent vibrations throughout the whole building—vibrations which none of the innocent mortals would feel, but which Merlin recognized instantly.

"Aithusa," Morgana confirmed the thought running across his mind, and her eyes sparkled as she saw the confusion and alarm in his ever-youthful face. She stepped closer to him, as though not afraid of his presence any longer. "Your magic is strong, Merlin—stronger than any other sorcerer's has ever been, but in cutting a piece of it from yourself you weakened it. It would take days for its strength to be regained to its full power."

Merlin's face remained as hardened to emotions as her own, but his eyes, which reveal all of one's soul, sifted to uncertainty. He knew she was correct; he could feel the empty place in his chest and knew that he would be weak for many more nights before it was replenished.

"What do you mean?" he asked, and there was a dread building low inside him as he looked into her eyes and saw a cunning which held no mercy.

"Even with yours weakened, my magic still wouldn't be potent enough to overwhelm it, after all these years you've had to build it up," she continued smoothly instead of answering him, as she moved closer like a ghostly monster in the blue flickers of the candles. "But you see—" Her hand went to her throat, where a golden chain encircled it and disappeared beneath the neckline of her gown. "—I have something to help with that."

From her gown, she removed a gemstone on the end of the chain—a gemstone which burned like the fire in their magic eyes. Waves of power rippled from it, and Merlin recognized that power by his comprehension as a dragonlord.

"Beautiful, isn't it?" Morgana smiled eerily as she gazed at it in her hand with a twisted pride. "Aithusa's magic is that straight from the gods themselves. All dragons' are, but then, of course, you knew that already, didn't you?"

Merlin pulled his eyes away from the sharp-edged, glowing rock and back to her face, question and trepidation equal in his countenance. Perhaps, if he were to his full potential, if he had not cut a hole in his magic, he would be strong enough—but a dragon's magic, one which had pulled away from his power over its spirit long ago, he could not resist in his exhausted state. He knew that as well as she apparently did.

"What are you doing?" he said, as the muscles in his body grew tense as he felt Aithusa shifting on the floor over his head, in a human form now, but present there for Morgana's beckoning.

Morgana never deemed him significant enough to answer. Her dark smile deepened, and in her next breath, words in Greek were uttered with intent.

"_Dó̱ste to myaló tou gia ména." _(5)

Magic so mighty and quick it stole his breath exploded from the combination of Morgana's flashing eyes and the dragon's power in the stone. Merlin shouted at the same moment,

"_Scildan!"_ (6)

It was as futile as he knew it would be. The shield held by his strength was as thin and weak as his soul had become due to the loss of a piece of it. The force of Aithusa and Morgana's power against him was a blinding gold like shimmering fire emitting itself across the room toward him, sizzling against his invisible protection like acid burning through fabric. The bottle containing his liquid magic struck painfully against his side as he collapsed to his knees, holding his hands outstretched before his face and crying out with the sharp pain of the magic shield being ripped away little by little.

At last, there was none of the shield left, and the black magic enveloped him. He shouted hoarsely as its white light overtook his entire body, lifting him into the air for a moment before it had entered him through his mouth and nose and infected him completely.

Morgana watched as Merlin's limp body dropped in the same moment the white glow of her and Aithusa's combined magic disappeared down his throat. When he opened his eyes again, they stared blankly, entirely black, reptilian.

She smiled in glee. At last, the great and mighty Emrys was hers to control.

* * *

_When the day ended, he scarcely even remembered that last duel._

_It was all but a blur—a whirling mixture of Mordred's forever iced eyes and his own desperate attempts to block with his immortal Excalibur the magic striking out at him from the young sorcerer's outstretched hands. He remembered small things—the sky's deepening in a smoky, otherworldly red, the trembling of the ground from rippling thunder, the stench of some strange perfume burning and pervading the air, and he recalled realizing suddenly that it was magic he smelt, and wondering if this was a sensation Merlin had all the time. This was the last, flashing thought he had before his memory skipped away from him again in a blur of wild fighting._

_He did not even remember the pain when Mordred's blade had finally reached its mark._

_He recalled only lying there for an instant, his own blood pooling beside him from a wound near his left ribs, and realizing that a sword enchanted by the dragon's breath had sliced through even his splendid armor to destroy his life._

_He recalled forcing his arms to push himself up so that he could crawl toward the fallen Excalibur. He defiantly ignored the excruciating agony seething in his side—too much agony for a mere wound, and there was that scent again…magic…burning magic…_

_On his hands and knees, he managed to drag himself to the hilltop looking over the now-quieting valley, and he raised his tear-stung eyes toward the horizon just as a strange wave of something shocked out of the top of Morgana's treacherous tower, moving in every direction across the skies as far as the eye could see. The next moment, the tower came tumbling to the ground, stone by gray stone, from the top to the base, until there was no more of it standing. Likewise, all the walls surrounding her hellish city fell, as did the houses, and all else._

_That was the end, he realized after a moment of silence, unable to move for the shock of seeing it. Morgana had fallen. Merlin had triumphed._

_A breath of relief wheezed out of his parched throat, and he felt himself smiling even as it became too much for him to hold up his head._

_Merlin did it. His idiot did it._

_Then, there was darkness and stillness all around. It lasted only moments, but to him, it felt like the sun rose over and over again until finally the presence of someone near him reached through the stillness to his senses._

_The figure did not speak, but he felt urgent hands roll him over upon his back, sending a new flash of anguish up his left side, from which he could barely resist crying out. All at once, the weight of his armor was gone from his chest, leaving nothing but his russet tunic to cover the bruises marring him from the battle. The hands—so gentle and cool—ghosted over the wound, which he could feel growing more and more inflamed and painful with every heartbeat._

_As though his body suddenly woke to realize that he was not dreaming, his eyes opened and he beheld the pallid, exhausted countenance of his dearest friend in all the world against the backdrop of the now-whitened sky. His face was lined with weariness and grief for the fallen men all around them, and perhaps for those who had fallen in all the years past as well, but he was _alive_, and apparently unharmed from his own, private battle in the tower, and that was well enough for Arthur._

"_Merlin." His voice was croaking and whispering, but he could not bring himself to care in the relief washing over him that_ finally_ it was all over._

_His warlock, just like always, froze and instantly looked to the face of his king._

_There was fear in his eyes, and Arthur, through the increasing haze in his head, thought that no, that wasn't right….The war was over….They were victorious….Merlin should never have to look afraid again…._

_There was a rustling somewhere close by, amidst the near-inaudible whistling of the wind across the field, and Merlin immediately reverted to his position as guardian, standing to his feet with a speed and agility which should not be possible for a man as old in body as he looked, holding himself solidly between the unknown person and the fallen king._

_Then, a pleading voice cut through the atmosphere, and Arthur pitied the one to whom he knew it belonged, though he could see no one from where he lay._

"_Help me, Emrys!"_

_And Merlin's answer, colder and harder than Arthur had ever heard him speak in all their lives together._

"_Is this really what you wanted, Morgana?" _

_She never was allowed to respond, for the next moment, she was dead by the hand of the warlock she had sought to murder for so long._ (7)

_Arthur wanted to speak when Merlin leant down again, to reprimand him harshly for killing her in coldness, or to comfort away the twisting guilt now on his face for doing so, but he did not. He only let the man rip apart the blood-soaked tunic and place his marble hand over the burning wound, doing nothing but concentrating upon his own breathing and the expressive demeanor of his friend._

_He scarcely saw Merlin's eyes change to that ever-familiar, liquid gold before a scream tore from his throat. He twisted, his body instinctively trying to move away from the pain which whipped through his entire form, like a lightning-strike running through his veins from the bleeding wound._

_Merlin's hand—the one which was not sticky with his draining blood—gripped his shoulder to steady him, his ragged voice, guilt-ridden and afraid, murmuring close to his ear,_

"_I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Arthur."_

_Arthur struggled to control his breath, and he supposed he should feel ashamed at his reaction, but he had never felt a pain so great in all his life, and this was Merlin with him—and he never had to pretend to be stronger than he was with Merlin._

"_Not…your fault," he managed between breaths, as his eyes focused on his friend's lined face, because he couldn't let Merlin believe any of this was because of him. "It's not your fault, Merlin."_

_Fear was trickling up the back of his neck nonetheless, because if Merlin's magic was empty of all power to heal him, there was nothing any being in all the five kingdoms could do._

* * *

Arthur shifted and groaned in his sleep, as though the silent, serpentine figure's shadow passing over his bed was enough to disturb his slumber.

* * *

_Flashes of time passing, and then he was beneath the canopy of his warm bed, and the window across the room was darkened by nightfall. Not even the moon or starlight shone on this night, and so the gently flickering flames of the candles the only points of light in his world any longer._

_Those, and the warlock standing at his bedside._

_Merlin's hands ran over a line of colorful glass bottles on the small table which had been moved close to him, but Arthur could see that he dared not pick one up. None of them had done anything but worsen the pain—for both of them._

_Once, long ago, Arthur might have fought his voice past the agony and made a witty remark about the uselessness of grief to brighten the air of death and doom surrounding them. Now, however, he remained silent, only watching Merlin's movements as he dipped a soft cloth in a bowl of cool water—no magic, just pure water—and turned back to face the king._

_Arthur made no sound as his side stung at the touch of the cloth, but Merlin winced for him._

"_Sorry," he whispered, never looking away from the wound as he cleansed it tenderly._

"_It's all right," he answered just as quietly, and he was proud of himself when his voice did not sound tight or strained, as he expected it would._

_More silence as Merlin wrapped crisp, white bandages over the injury and continued to clean the smaller stripes and bruises along his torso and arms. Arthur wondered why it was no one had come in to disturb them. Surely there must have been a hundred of his men waiting to speak with him now that the war was over and the kingdom needed rebuilding._

"_Guinevere," he said, the name coming out of his mouth the moment it reached his mind, his hand reaching out as though to get his warlock's attention as Merlin squeezed the red from his cloth in the bowl of darkening water. "Merlin, where is Guinevere?"_

_Merlin did not answer for a long moment. Neither did he look into Arthur's face as he used a clean rag to rinse a thin cut across the king's arm. Arthur felt Merlin's hands trembling as he did so. Merlin's hands never trembled._

_The king swallowed against the thoughts building a lump in his throat, and then Merlin finally looked at him, and there were tears glistening in his sorrowful blue eyes._

"_I'm sorry, Arthur. They were attacked in the citadel. None of them survived."_

_It felt as though his breath was sucked from his lungs, and he blinked rapidly and tried to remind himself that it was all right, that he was dying too. Soon, they would be together again. He would see her in just a little while, and tell her all about their victory this day. He would tell all of them who had gone before._

_Nevertheless, one tear fell and left a mark upon the pillow under his head._

_He refused to let any more go, however, and so he lifted his eyes to where Merlin sat on the mattress, facing him as he continued futilely to wash the dirt from the battle from the king's scarred body._

"_Merlin."_

_As though already knowing what the king was to say, Merlin never looked up at him this time, only continued to rub the cloth over his chest and arms with wrinkled, shaking hands, his white head bent._

"_I'm sorry," the warlock, his voice so old—ancient, and worn, in this form of an aged man. "I'm sorry, my lord. I have done all I can do. Aithusa's magic is strong and potent; he enchanted the blade. There is nothing I can do to reverse it. I would do anything."_

"_I know, Merlin," he interrupted before his good warlock could continue rambling._

_He said nothing else. Contrary to some of his less proud moments, the king of Camelot was not a fool. He had been watching. He had seen the infirmity and dejection building a veil in Merlin's old, storm eyes with each ineffectual potion and spell over him. He knew this was the end of his destiny for this life. For the first time in his years, Arthur had no reason to battle death; his kingdom was freed from the threat of its darkest foe, his people would be well and safe for the oncoming months of harvest, and all of his loved ones had already passed onto the next existence._

_It was in that moment that he abruptly comprehended something which brought a wave of sadness upon him._

_His eyes lit with the dismal understanding, and all thoughts of himself were driven from his mind as he watched Merlin turn back to the bowl and squeeze the water and blood from the rag._

"_Merlin."_

_He saw narrow, hunched shoulders stiffen at the sound of his voice, for his tone had changed now. Even he could hear the ring of acceptance and pity as he spoke the name of his friend into the stillness._

"_Show me your true form, please. I don't want my last memory of you to be an enchantment."_

_His eyes never even saw the moment when it happened, but when Merlin turned toward him once more, his back was straightened, his hair dark and short, his face clean-shaven and free of all lines of his age. His eyes were the same, however, and his hands, no matter how youthful, never ceased their trembling as he retook his place on the side of the bed, bent face toward Arthur._

_It had been a great many months—perhaps even years—since Arthur had seen Merlin this way. For many reasons, they had decided long ago that Merlin should mask himself so that others would never learn of his immortality. The least of reasons was that it helped them both pretend this was not real, he believed, but to see him like this, now, when he neared the close of his own life, made Arthur smile inexplicably._

"_How is that fair?" he murmured weakly, and it was, perhaps, against his nature to voice every thought in his mind, but here, he could not find a reason to retain those old walls of self-control any longer._

_Merlin, surprise alight in his face at the words, lifted his gaze to meet his king's, and Arthur could not resist raising one of his own, aged hands to touch his fingers beneath the other man's smooth jaw._

"_The rest of us have to become old and feeble," the king went on teasingly, "and you get to stay like this, just as handsome and strong as you ever were."_

_Merlin averted his eyes to the floor, and both his hands came up to encircle Arthur's fingers, holding them in their place near his face even when Arthur became too weak to hold his hand up._

"_You're still handsome too," came the mumbled words, and despite the sadness lacing each one, Arthur could not help but chuckle lightly at his warlock._

_His laughter died away quickly, however. He knew the solemnity of their plight. He knew what was going to happen after he was gone from this world. The single tear so close to spilling from Merlin's eye was evidence enough of it._

"_Everything is going to be all right," he said, and even the intonation sounded the same as all the countless times when Merlin had said it to him, in the darkest times of his life._

_Merlin had always been right. Arthur wasn't sure if he was._

"_You'll see, Merlin." He said it anyway. "Everything will be all right in the end."_

_There was a long moment of silence then, during which Merlin held Arthur's fingers so tightly they numbed in his grasp and he stared at the night-black window across the place. It was as though he were seeing something there which captivated him. Perhaps he was, Arthur thought. How many memories were enshrined in this room, at that old desk by the window? How many phantoms of himself and Merlin—and others, countless others—could be pictured here?_

_Only one memory would stand out now, however, and Arthur would not have it ruined by grieving for the past._

"_Merlin, look at me."_

_Merlin did, his soft countenance so filled with intense sadness and loss that the king almost wanted to weep himself at the sight of it._

"_There are things you need to know," he stated, but an attack of persistent pain burned up his side, making his voice breathless and tired._

_Merlin instantly leant forward, still holding Arthur's right hand in his own, and touched the side of the other man's throat, which he'd learnt early always got Arthur's attention._

"_Don't talk if you can't—" he started, but the king cut him off resolutely._

"_No," he said, for these things on his mind needed to be said, before they parted ways for however great a time it might be. "Listen to me, Merlin. I want you to know, before I leave…"_

_Merlin's fingers tightened around his own._

"…_I never meant those things I said. You're not an idiot. Well, perhaps, not all the time, at least."_

_The laugh which bubbled in the warlock's throat might not have been entirely genuine, but it was something._

"_I never let my father flog you. He wanted to, sometimes, but I always talked you out of it. Most of the time, you never knew."_

_The merriment in the air was gone now, fled as hastily as it had come, and Arthur wasn't even considering what he said anymore. He just _needed_ Merlin to _hear_ him._

"_I never minded when you took what was left of my food. I left some there on purpose for you."_

"_I know you did," Merlin said, and Arthur could be pleased, if nothing else, there was a vague glow of fondness partially covering the grief in his friend's face._

"_All those times when I was angry and I told you I was going to exile you if you defied me, I was lying."_

_Something of a smile curved at the corner of Merlin's mouth, but it did not quite reach his eyes._

"_I'm not trying to bring myself up, in any way," Arthur felt he needed to say, and he wished with his entire being that he was not so terrible at putting together words, so that he could tell Merlin exactly what was in his heart without muddling it all up. "I just want you to know…I _need_ you to understand, Merlin, that I did try to give back to you, for all the things you did for me. I never really knew how, but I did try."_

"_You didn't have to," came the solid reassurance. "I understood. I always did."_

_Another sharp stab in his side reminded Arthur that he had precious little time remaining._

"_I want you to do something for me," he said, as strong as he could._

"_Anything." Without hesitating, unmeditated, like an inborn reply._

_Arthur smiled, despite his suffering._

"_I want you," he said, in as much of that old, overbearing tone as he could muster, "to get out of here."_

_A half-moment of confusion passed across Merlin's face, dispelled the next instant._

"_I want you to go and visit all those places you read about in the library," Arthur told him, and he was ever grateful that the gods have him these few moments to say these things he had been planning for years. "I want you to see all those strange lands across the seas. Pick a few oranges yourself."_

_A shadow fell over Merlin's features at the notion of leaving Camelot; Arthur knew that's what it was, but this was for the best. His Merlin had been kept here for so long, fighting this battle for this kingdom. For him to remain here, suddenly alone with all his friends and family dead, would tear him apart. He needed to escape—to try to forget it all and move on as best he could._

_Arthur had thought through it all for many years, and discussed it with Guinevere when Merlin was not with them. They had vowed together to do what they could to look after Merlin, when they were gone and he was still here._

"_Arthur, I—" Merlin was saying, but again, Arthur stopped him with an imploration._

"_Please, Merlin."_

_The warlock must have seen something in his face which changed his mind, because he clutched his hand tighter in both of his own and nodded._

"_I will," he promised._

"_You still have the ring I gave you?" It was more a statement than question; Merlin always had his ring._

_The warlock nodded nonetheless, and tugged on the leather strand around his neck until the familiar silver appeared from beneath his eggshell tunic._

"_Take it with you," Arthur said, and it was not a command from his king, but a request from his friend, "to…remember me by."_

_It was then that the tears glistening in Merlin's eyes could not be fought away any longer. Two fell; one of them landed on the back of Arthur's hand, still intertwined as it was with Merlin's._

"_I would never forget you, my lord," he whispered, and the next was choked and scarcely audible. "I couldn't. You're a part of me. Always."_

_Arthur smiled again. To hear that, like a vow made to the very air around them, made him feel complete in a way he did not, and perhaps would never, entirely comprehend. Even should he be immortal likewise, and live a hundred thousand years or more, he would never be able to fathom why Merlin revered him so. He knew of their bond of destiny; he knew it like it was written in ink on his heart, but surely even that was not enough to make Merlin love him as much as he did. He had long learnt, though, that it did not matter why. As long as he knew it was so, he could be satisfied with the friendship he was blessed to have._

_Another spasm of pain wracked his body, and abruptly he was aware of everything. He was bare heartbeats from death now, and soon, he would be with all of those he'd lost in his years of life…and Merlin would be facing the world alone, where he couldn't reach him to protect him._

_Merlin, at seeing Arthur's pain, exhaled sharply as though he felt it himself, but there was nothing he could do, so he just held his hand._

"_There's one last thing, Merlin," Arthur said, and his voice was so infuriatingly quiet now, his strength all but gone. "I want you to promise me something."_

_The king opened his eyes where they had closed on their own volition and focused on the forever youthful face of his greatest friend. There was but this last thing he had to say; he had to be assured before he was gone, so that he would know his warlock would not turn into a man he wouldn't recognize. He had to know that, whenever they met again, Merlin would still be _his_ Merlin._

"_Promise me that you won't be like them," he said, almost pleadingly, as their eyes locked, dark, brave blue to sorrowful, longing gray. "Promise me you won't ever turn into them, Merlin, no matter what happens. Don't ever let anything change you from who you are."_

_More tears fell upon their hands, but neither of them paid any heed._

"_I promise," Merlin said, and Arthur could see it in his eyes that he did._

_There were scant moments of silence, and then Merlin leant closer to him and spoke, wakening him from where he had begun to fade._

"_Promise me something too, Arthur," said the urgent, tearful voice._

"_Anything." It was his answer, too, it seemed._

"_When you're gone," Merlin's voice tripped over the word, "wherever you go, whatever happens, don't forget me, either. Please remember me."_

_Arthur forced his eyes, though so heavy, to stay open so that he could look into his warlock's as he spoke._

"_I could never forget you, Merlin."_

_A shaking exhale, and Arthur tightened his fingers as much as his dying strength would let him._

"_Don't be afraid," he said, and the room was so dark now, he could barely even see Merlin's reactions anymore, but he knew he was there, and so he would keep talking for as long as he could. "It will all be fine, Merlin. You'll be fine."_

"_I don't want you to leave me."_

_He could see nearly nothing now, but he kept his eyes open just a slit, just so Merlin could see that he was still with him._

"_I'm not," he whispered, and it was so quiet, he could only hope he was heard, for he wished Merlin could believe it as much as he did. "You gave me hope, all my life. I'll give you hope now. This isn't goodbye. You must remember that."_

"_I love you." Uttered as though in desperation, like he had not said it since they were young and was the last chance he would ever have._

"_I love you, Merlin," he answered, willingly. "I'll see you again."_

_He could no longer feel even the touch of Merlin's hand around his own. The darkness took him, and then he was gone._

* * *

Arthur awoke gasping for breath, his eyes burning with tears a thousand years old, his body trembling and his hand cold as ice where Merlin's hands had enveloped it in his dream. The pain in his head was vanished, his fever dissipated, his body stronger than it had been in months.

He choked on a sob, his heart stumbling in his chest.

_It was all real._

**To be continued  
(in Part vi)**

* * *

(1) According to what legend I can find, this was Uther Pendragon's birthplace.

(2) From A Herald of the New Age (Episode 10, Season 4), beginning at 35:57.

(3) From The Secret Sharer (Episode 7, Season 4), beginning at 41:09.

(4) From The Sword in the Stone, Part 2 (Episode 13, Season 4), beginning at 15:56.

(5) Rough Greek: "Give his mind to me."

(6) Old English: "Shield!"

(7) Sound vaguely familiar? I miiiight have swiped that little part just because I wanted something to tie in that would make good sense with the show. It's from one of Morgana's nightmares in Season 4. Shhhh. (Sorry, but it's really too early in the morning for me to go searching for that particular scene. It's there, somewhere.)

* * *

_Yes, it's another cliffhanger! I'm sorry! (But you know I'm not really.)  
I know this isn't really useful information, but my original book is steadily becoming something actually readable. Wish me luck on it in the next few months! (Please!)  
Songs for this part (and previous ones may still apply):  
Keep Holding On by Avril Lavigne  
Heavy in Your Arms by Florence and the Machine  
You and Me Both by The Classic Crime  
It's four-thirty now, so I'll just leave you with the usual. Merlin, you want to take it from here?  
"There's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it."  
And Arthur?  
"You're always better than you give yourself credit for. Remember that."  
Yeeeeeah. I think it's time for me to sleep. Goodnight, all!_


	7. Part vi

_I promised myself that I'd do my best not to be late on updates this time; I'm so sorry this is almost four days late! But seriously, I was so tired Friday night (second day of school) I'm terrified to think of how many typos would have gone overlooked if I hadn't saved the editing for later. It would have been absolutely disastrous; you would have lost all respect for my meager writing skill if you'd read it unedited. Trust me.  
This is completely beside the point, but my school only has twenty-two kids this year. Total. In kindergarten through twelfth grade. And yes, it's an actual school. With a building and a principal and whatnot. (Also. They want the girls to wear hose. I'm seventeen and they want me to wear hose. I'm like o_O Not likely. lol)  
Enjoy, my dears, and thanks so much for reading and reviewing so far! You guys are all fantastic. I hope you like this wild chapter; it is wild._

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Part vi**

In a place where mortals would never breathe the cool air and time would never have its ruinous effect, two ancient creatures of the Old Religion stood in a great room where the floor was water, the walls were glass, and the ceiling was a mural of the night sky.

"This is where you hid it," Morgana breathed, as her forever cold, sharp eyes took in the untouched architecture all around them—the walls made of perfectly etched stone, the windows made of mosaic glass in all colors and shades, the way the dark water rippled at their feet where they stood in the arched threshold.

Light came from somewhere, though it was impossible to know where, but it was hardly enough to cast a glow upon even half the room, so enormous it was—bigger than any sanctuary of any cathedral in all the world. It was visible merely a few steps in front of them before the rest of the place was washed in black shadows, bathing half of two of the magnificent stained glass windows facing each other in darkness, cutting off their story mid-way through.

Merlin's eyes, black and wet as a dragon's, flashed in a ring of fire beside her, and the torches lining the walls on either side of every grand window burst into a bright flame, lighting the centuries-old haven with their glow.

Morgana looked to him carefully. His eyelids fluttered every few heartbeats, as though his own magic were battling inside of him with the black power which had invaded his mind and body. His countenance was as lifeless and fixed as marble, his flesh white as death and cold to the touch, but his breath was uneven, harsh and fluctuating in his nostrils. She wondered if he could still see and know what was happening around him—what he was doing.

She hoped he could.

The room where he had brought her by his power at her command was indeed more glorious and immense than any place on Earth. It stretched on for a great distance, like a flooded ballroom from a time of elegant parties and mystical celebrations, the torches on the other end of the place pinpricks of light reflecting in the shifting waves beneath them. A great mural stood out upon that distant wall, its paint somehow luminescent so that it appeared almost real from where they stood. White mountains, majestic and timeless, stood out against the blue-gray of a storm-clouded sky, and they were mountains Morgana recognized, despite the thousand years since she'd laid eyes upon them.

"So the legends were true," said she, turning her gaze away from the room and to the old warlock standing against his will by her side. "It was returned to Avalon, after all, and you moved the entire lake here. It was _'Arthur's alone to wield_,' is that why?"

Merlin blinked, the tiny muscles around his eyes quivering, fingers trembling at his sides.

Morgana smirked at his inability to answer, and then she raised her eyes upward toward the black, star-dusted ceiling high above the haven. On the tops of either side walls, like twin angels without wings, effigies of the Lady of the Lake stood upon crystal ledges, their arms outstretched; in the midst of them, a gleaming sword hung vertical as though held in the air by magic in their hands. It was so very far from the ground and from the walls that no man could ever hope to reach it alone. It was suspended there seemingly for all of eternity.

Morgana clenched her jaw and faced Merlin. The shifting waters cast strange, alien shapes across the warlock's midnight shirt, the stained windows reflecting a kaleidoscope of colors across his ancient face as she glared at him in the dimness of the place.

His eyes blinked, slowly. It would not be much longer before his powerful magic broke through even hers and the dragon's.

"Well, it won't be Arthur's for much longer now," said she in a voice like jagged rocks. "Bring Excalibur to me."

* * *

Far away, in a world of men and war, a new Arthur Pendragon banged upon the door as hard as his strength could manage.

He was absolutely entirely uncaring what time of the night it was or which wealthy and respectable neighbors he would wake by his noise, or how many of them would recognize him by his name in the world. Gregory was no longer his name, not any longer, and his true name was known in a world much more wondrous and meaningful than this one in which he had been living for so long.

More than that, his name was known by a certain man more wondrous and meaningful than any in this world.

"Colin!"

He thundered louder upon the frame, jarring the copper handle almost violently enough to shake the screws from the wood.

"Colin! Let me in!"

When there was yet no answer, Arthur, hands shaking—now with agitation, no longer with illness or pain, reached into his pocket, suddenly grateful his wise friend had insisted he make a second key to his flat for Arthur to keep, should he ever need it.

He hadn't, until now.

He got the key into the lock easily enough despite the excitement burning through his entire body and making his hands unsteady. He shoved the door open just as the first irritable retired couples began to exit their rooms, grumbling to know what the matter was.

Arthur stumbled into the dark flat and kicked the door closed behind him.

"Colin!" he shouted again into the silent room, and he could feel it—for the first time in so very long, he could _feel_ his eyes sparkling. "Colin, I know—I remember, well, _everything_! Colin, come out here!"

He could scarcely wait to look his dear friend in his timeworn, blue eyes and tell him. He could only imagine the expressions which would pass over his friend's handsome, contoured face when he heard Arthur call him _Merlin_ again, tripping over his own words as he struggled to describe the sensation of knowing everything, of remembering who he was—who they both were, their destiny, their lives together, so long ago, _but not so long ago_—all of it. Every memory, all those frustrating times when he couldn't ever _see_, it was all clear, completely; Merlin's face—that first day of their meeting to that last moment of his life—was visible to him as the moon after a fog, in every dream he could remember since he was a child.

Arthur knew himself well enough to know that he would be terrible at explaining it all, his words never as clear and expressive as he would like for them to be, but he knew that Merlin would understand. He always had, and _did_.

Merlin, Colin. One and the same, _both his_. He could not wait to see him.

"Colin—!"

His smiling cry as he ran in the dark toward the bedroom was broken off when his foot touched a glass bottle. It was lying on the floor in the center of the sitting room, and his voice inexplicably left him, as though he had had some grand realization, though he knew not what.

Feeling compelled, Arthur leant down and picked it up. The moonlight pouring into through the window struck the pale blue liquid, reflecting in it and making it glow in Arthur's palm. It looked as though it should be cold; it was warm, though, its warmth seeping even through the thick glass of the bottle which held it and soothing the skin of his fingertips. It seemed to move of its own force, fluidly shifting on the inside of the bottle and leaving a tiny sparkle of light where it went.

Arthur's eyes widened. He knew what this was. Magic.

"Merlin," he whispered the name passing across his mind, and it felt good just to say it aloud, knowing that he was real.

_Gods, Merlin was real._

He was just overcome with that insatiable urge to see him, speak to him as his true self, as King Arthur of Camelot, he felt the presence of someone behind him in the darkness of the room.

He turned just a half-second before claws—white as ivory and where human fingernails should have been—sliced through the air, scantly missing his blonde hair as he fell out of the way of them.

A half-human creature—figure of a young man with rippled, snowy hair, but eyes and claws and tail of a beast—hissed at him in the darkness of Colin's flat, the noise of it one which he knew from a lifetime past.

"Aithusa," he said aloud, and at his name, the creature lunged at him again, as though angered that Arthur recognized him so quickly.

With the room unlit but for the moonlight to his left, Arthur blocked near-blindly.

He released a tiny grunt when Aithusa's claw sliced into his forearm, but rolled quickly out of the way when orange flames cascaded from his eerily human mouth.

Arthur had been in this flat enough to know the layout of the place, despite the darkness, and so he leapt over the antique sofa and pulled one of the old, French swords from Colin's collection in an iron umbrella stand beside a bookcase.

The blade cut through the air with a whisper that was refreshingly beautiful to Arthur's ears. Even as he moved toward Aithusa, in the back of his mind, he felt as though there was an empty place behind him where his companion should be to guard him. A flash of _where are you?_, and he was leaping sideways to avoid another blast of fire from the personified dragon.

Just as memory began to form itself, of years of training not in a special gymnasium where he'd attended since he was ten, but a large field where his father, the king, had first taught him how to hold a sword, another mighty voice fairly shook the walls of the place, over the noise of their small but violent battle.

* * *

It was several heartbeats' time before Morgana's command fought through Merlin's defensive shields and forced his actions to comply.

His eyes closed, as though like a message to her, so that she would know he had no desire to watch this come to pass. She cared little what he felt or thought, however—only that she got from his secrets what she wanted.

The waters seemed to become agitated by whatever power came from the warlock's mind, shifting more restlessly against the walls, as though the lake recognized him and for him alone would it awaken. The place seemed to grow darker, despite that the torches continued their light. The effigies lowered their marble arms.

The words written in the language of the Old Religion which decorated the blade glowed in white, as though a warning as it was lowered to just above the water's shifting waves—a warning to any who might be taking it from its resting-place, a warning to beware of what it was capable.

_Take me up. Cast me away._

Merlin's eyes reopened, a ring of white like the magic of the sword dissipating like smoke from his eyes, his gaze instantly locked upon the terrible blade as it hovered just above the lake while the waters eased and calmed.

Morgana was not looking at him, her eyes only for the gift she would steal away after all her efforts. With intent, but barely considering herself, she stepped forward into the dark lake whose surface was now straight as the horizon.

The mosaic pebbles under her right foot on the magic-made shore cracked as though in angry protest, breaking apart the medieval mosaic flower in its design. Her eyes snapped away from the sword as she gasped and stepped both feet back upon the solid stone, sneering hatefully at Merlin after she had.

"You get it," she commanded him, recognizing that the lake itself was a trap to guard the precious treasure belonging to King Arthur and his clever wizard.

Merlin's breath stopped in his throat, as though his entire body was rejecting her willpower over him.

She grasped his wrist so that her long, strong nails would leave half-moons in his pale flesh, never noticing that the coldness from her spell over him was all but gone and his life's warmth was nearly restored.

Morgana never knew as she shoved him forward toward her prize that he blinked once more and the black was gone from his eyes, leaving his own iris of ancient storm-blue to reign again.

Merlin inhaled slowly so that she, standing behind him now in expectancy of his collaboration with her demands, would not notice the change in his posture as his magic overpowered the wicked enchantment and chased it away completely.

He took the first step toward Excalibur, never speaking his freedom aloud, holding the façade just long enough to fool her. Morgana watched as his feet—clad always in the Converse sneakers Arthur had bought for him in good will so many months before—met the surface of the water and did not sink. She showed no surprise, for she felt none at this phenomenon; it was clear that this place revolved around Merlin's spirit. Only he could walk on the water and be accepted.

When he was several steps away, making no mark on the surface of the black water except tiny ripples, Merlin turned. When Morgana saw the beautiful blue of his eyes, she would have lashed out at him with more of her black magic, but in the same instant, the water shifted form again; Merlin held his pale hand out in control of it. This time, it rose in a great wave which went from floor to ceiling in a blink of time and cracked and shimmered as it froze to solid ice, the lines in it shifting electric blue with Merlin's protective magic.

Merlin lowered his hand. He and Morgana looked into one another's eyes through the shield of solid Avalon water, and the witch saw exactly the same message in his gaze which had been there the day he and Arthur found one another again, when he had sat in the hall outside of Anthony Gregory's office and seen her watching him from the end of the polished hall.

_Not this time._

He would not let her take anything from him this time—nothing at all.

Rage flashed like magic in her eyes, and with a scream that was muffled through the water-wall, she raised both her hands and threw all her power forward.

Merlin dropped out of the way as the wall shattered, shards of the frozen lake slicing through the air and crashing into the dark waters beyond.

* * *

Aithusa froze where he was standing, his wholly black eyes alit with an abrupt fright that had nothing to do with the meager, old weapon in the hands of the Once and Future King.

Arthur, where he had been forced to his back on the floor, watched in shock as another man—or was it truly a man?—appeared from the shadows. He spoke to the other male in a language Arthur did not understand, one which sounded even more ancient than his native language of the Old Albion. It sounded like a language of the gods.

Arthur stood slowly as Aithusa answered back in the same words, gripping the dull blade in his hand, prepared to fight both creatures should he need. He could not see the man's face, for his back was turned to him where they stood near the window, but suddenly, he lifted both his hands, cutting off whatever the smaller being was uttering to him. Aithusa's half-human body was hurled back, though the taller had not touched him, and the window shattered as he crashed through it and fell. He reappeared in seconds, however, now a whole dragon again, flying high above the lights of the city and vanishing into the glittering night sky.

Despite what he had done, the newcomer did not turn to face the king.

Arthur stepped toward him tentatively, stepping carefully over items which had been strewn about the floor by some other purpose before any of them had entered here. He held the sword high at the taller man's turned back, and said in a voice that was exactly like the one he heard from himself in his incredible dreams, strong with his soul's strength, so ready after years of dormancy to exhibit itself,

"Who are you? Show yourself."

The figure turned, his long cloak moving elegantly with him, and Arthur caught a brief glimpse of eyes shining with golden power and then every candle and electric light in the place flickered on.

Arthur's shoulders relaxed with a strange relief, his eyes narrowing as he beheld the face before him and his mind struggled to place how he knew it, so very familiar as it was. Hair like strands of gold fell to broad shoulders covered with a dark red cloak. Oval eyes liquid black locked calmly upon his, a face, somewhat aged but long and handsome nevertheless, smiling mildly at him as though he were an old friend.

Arthur could not stop himself from gasping silently as he realized.

"Kilgharrah," he murmured understandingly, turning the sword in his hands downward in respect of their old alliance.

"The Once and Future King has returned," said that voice with an answering reverence, in the Old language, as the dragon bowed his human head in greeting to him.

Arthur inhaled quietly, straightening his shoulders from where he had been in a defensive stance. In the back of his throat, there was that desire to ask him so many questions which he knew the all-wise creature would answer in truth. How many years had really passed? Why was he here now? How much had the world truly changed? As his eyes roamed the dark walls, and the silence filled the empty place beside him, however, there was only one question he _needed_ answered.

"Where is he?" He turned his attention back to the other ancient soul, his eyes pleading as his tone. "Please, where is Colin?"

Even in the dimness, he could see the old one's coal eyes tighten with solemnity.

"The warlock has been taken," said he lowly in answer to the man who had freed him in the old times.

"Taken?" A cold feeling washed over Arthur as he repeated the chilling word, and there were a great deal of thoughts running through his mind as he struggled to recall everything that had been happening in the months since he had discovered Colin—or Colin had discovered him—in an effort to piece together the drama being enacted around him which he'd not been able to comprehend.

"By the witch, your old foe, Morgana."

Arthur's teeth clenched together as he took in this answer. Of course it was her. She had been here, all this time. Kate.

"She exploited his weakness for you, Arthur," Kilgharrah continued, his voice loud and strong but with a whispering power which no ordinary man would recognize. "In making you ill against the memories she was trying to forbid, she was setting a plan to destroy him which could not fail."

Arthur turned as the old dragon reached out with a human hand. The bottle of glowing magic rose up from where he had dropped it upon the wooden floor to grasp at the sword in the skirmish against Aithusa. Now, the king felt the significance of it; an inexplicable urge to protect it rose in his throat, for this was a pure magic which had been long-since drained from the earth except for in his precious friend. He moved to it, setting the sword aside upon a nearby chair, and Kilgharrah let it fall into his hands, where it would be safe.

"The warlock is frail," Kilgharrah told him, and there was an underlying electricity in his voice, "but his power is greater than it has ever been. You have ensured that."

"_I_ have?" Arthur questioned with surprise, for surely he had no magic to supply his friend, and even if he did have, he had been too blinded all these years to know how to give it to him.

"Your life gave him reason to replenish strength anew to his powers," came the answer, and he almost could hear a peculiar sort of gratitude in the tranquil voice which had been one of those haunting his dreams. "Merlin will be able to break free of the control Morgana has put over his mind, but the question is—will it be in time to prevent her from getting what she wants, what she has come back after all these years to take?"

Arthur's brow furrowed as he considered what the dragon said; then, his face lit with a terrible understanding, his fingers tightening reflexively around the bottle of soft magic in his hand.

"Excalibur," said he, looking back into the black eyes of his ally. "She wants Excalibur."

"Indeed, she does, young king. It holds the power of life and death, but there is much more to it than that. You and your warlock knew this; it is why you were only one worthy of bearing it, Arthur. The sword can be used in the hand of its wielder to call forth all the natural magic buried deep within the earth. It can awaken any power, light or dark, if it is blessed by the power created when the magics align together. The time of this happening is this very night. That is why the witch chooses now to act."

"Morgana means to use Excalibur to take Albion," Arthur said knowingly, for this had always been her desire: to have the land Arthur won through his goodness and fairness and change it to a land opposite of everything Uther had ever intended. "Where are they, Kilgharrah? Where did she take him?"

The dragon averted his eyes for a moment.

"I do not know, King," he said gravely. "The hiding-place of Excalibur was a secret to all except Merlin. He built a haven for it in a realm known to only himself."

"He built an entire realm to hide it?" Arthur asked, and for the first time in what felt like a thousand years (perhaps it had been, he recognized), he felt incredibly impressed by the abilities of his brave warlock.

"Excalibur is a weapon that could bring death to all the world, and even beyond, in the wrong hands." Then, Kilgharrah's human expressions softened as he regarded the young man. "The most effective magic is fuelled by emotion, Arthur. The warlock made good of the grief he felt from all of your deaths."

Arthur's eyes lit up once more with an entirely different surprise. The last memory he had of his dear friend came to his mind—of sad, lonely eyes, a face too young to be so haunted, hands trembling as he said goodbye to all he'd known.

Kilgharrah smiled with kindness at him; since he had first heard Merlin's and Arthur's voices echoing in his mind from the surface above, that very first day in Camelot, he had known. He could sense it then, and here, over a thousand years later, that bond they had unwittingly forged that day had proven itself time and again.

"Now, it is up to you, King."

Arthur's back straightened at that, for though the words were spoken with grace, he felt the weight of them for what they were.

"Me?" he repeated; the Great Dragon knew that he had no magic—not really, only a tender ability, an echo of it from where Merlin, the man-personification of magic, was bound to him. He knew who he was; he was the Once and Future King, the greatest leader there has ever been or will ever be amongst mankind; Merlin had believed that, and he had evidenced it to himself in that final battle. But magic was something entirely different. How could he, who was born to fight with the sword and lead good people with freedom and fairness, possibly be a match for Morgana's supernatural powers, without Merlin to guide him from here?

A building light got his attention, and he looked down to find the beautiful magic in the bottle to be glowing brighter than before.

"Only you have a consecrated union with Merlin," said the dragon. "Only you can find him now, Arthur. His magic will only accept you."

Arthur blinked down at the magic, holding it up in both his hands, and he knew that the dragon was correct. He could only hope he was as much worthy of it now as he had been, that it would see in his heart whatever it was that Merlin always had, what had kept Merlin's faith in him even now, after everything, all these months of constantly denying who they both were.

Kilgharrah smiled again, his eyes suddenly turning to their natural gold once more; he had seen what Arthur would do, and now he could leave knowing the Once and Future King would indeed do all he could.

"Wait."

The dragon turned back just as he was a step away from the broken window.

"What is it, Arthur?"

The young man fingered something in his pocket, pulling it out and holding it in his hand. It was a ring, old and heavy with meaning.

"It was Morgana, wasn't it, who killed my father? Anthony, just as she did Uther."

Kilgharrah sighed, for though he felt no loss at the death of either man, there were but two of mankind he wished never to see suffer.

"Yes, King, but you needn't mourn him any longer. Anthony Gregory knew of the past shadows of your lives; I myself reawakened his own memories when you were but a child. He is at peace now, just as your father from then is at peace."

With that, his golden eyes flashed brighter, and his form reverted to its true form, his great wings stretching themselves out and taking to the sky.

Arthur watched him go and clutched Merlin's magic against his chest, fingers trembling despite his newfound courage.

* * *

Merlin, at the same moment as the wall of ice shattered, ran with all his might to where Excalibur hung by ancient magic over the dark waters, his frantic footsteps sending ripples over the surface but his feet, welcomed by the magic here, never sank. He ripped off the long, indigo scarf he wore around his neck and shoulders and hastily wrapped the sharp, silver blade, covering its glow, even as he prayed for safety for Arthur and for victory for himself.

He looked up as he heard Morgana shouting through the cracks she had made in the ice-wall, but there was nothing she could do. She could not make it across Avalon to where he was; the haven which kept the lake safe—and Excalibur—would not let her.

Merlin felt suddenly dizzy; the black magic had left an effect upon his spirit. It had weakened him further, but he pressed his hand to his head and steadied his mind. He could not stop now. He had to get Excalibur out of this place now that it was exposed to their enemy.

He summoned his magic and flicked his hand toward the corner where the enchanted mural of the White Mountains met the stone walls. In answer to his summons, the illusion of stone bricks faded like vapor in imperceptible breeze to reveal a swirling staircase. When he looked back over his shoulder, Morgana was gone, the room as empty of life as it had been before—more so, perhaps, now that Excalibur was in his arms. She would be going backwards through the doorway, he knew; she would find her way up from this lower level of the haven, but his secret way was quicker. He would be to the escape before she would now where to look.

He ran up the rounding, windowless staircase, never missing a step as he did, the sword held protectively under his arm.

By the other staircase on the opposite side of the place, Morgana's footsteps echoed against the dark walls and stained glass windows, her call echoing louder, her eyes flashing.

"Aithusa! _Éla se ména_!" (1)

* * *

Arthur fingered the magic in his hand, holding the old sword in his other tightly as though it had become a part of himself in the moments he'd been holding it, just as it had always felt when he'd been the champion of Camelot. Only now, the bluish magic glowing from the opened bottle in his palm had his attentions more than any of the most magnificent swords ever could.

Arthur knew how the magics of the world worked. Only one with a soul knit for it could bear the weight of such power upon it, and even then, his might would have to be strong enough to use it. He closed his eyes and prayed that he was all of these things he needed to be.

Even as he held the bottle in his hand and tried to draw from the fluctuating cool-warm of its contents, a flash of something crossed over his consciousness—a feeling from long ago, felt only once but mighty enough to make a memory upon him. To be drawing forth now in these desperate hopes it would lead him to his friend, it was the same as when he had been a young king.

At that, images passed over his mind, and he felt a rush of peace when they brought with them no pain as they had before.

He saw behind the darkness of his eyelids himself, standing in his glinting armor in a clearing, trees and men and women—_his_ men and women, those who relied upon him with their very lives—watching to see what he would do, and Merlin…Merlin behind him, always behind him, talking to him in that voice which held so many secrets and yet so much loyalty.

"_Have faith, Arthur."_

Eyes still closed so that the vision of his cherished past would not fade, Arthur put the bottle to his lips and drank the sweet, smooth, immortal magic, bidding it to take him back to the Merlin he'd been missing for so much longer than he even knew.

There was a strange whisper of feeling throughout his body, like a salty ocean breeze against bare skin, and he could not be sure but it sounded as though there was a tiny silver bell's chime in his head, and then he knew he was not standing in Colin's city flat any longer.

He opened his eyes and instinctively clutched the old French sword tighter in his fist, and he supposed any other man would have been terrified or unnerved by the total change of the sight before him, but he could only be entranced.

Arthur's eyes roamed up at the enormous ceiling, and he had been, in his travels, to great cathedrals all over the world, from the Washington in America to the Koln in Germany; none of them were like this, however—none of them even compared. This place was as silent as a cemetery, as solemn and dark as any of those cathedrals' most preserved and sacred rooms, but dancing in the dustless air all around him, he could feel the power floating, the ancient mystery almost a scent, unfading, unrealistic, but existing all the same.

For a long moment's time, Arthur forgot his purpose in the view of it. He could only look at the magnificent place and think,

_I am here. This is real._

Then, his eyes caught sight of the windows, enormous and adorned with dark hues of purple and blue and other royal colors. His depth of fascination pulling him to the first one on the left, on the other side of the stone column detailed with an etched embellishment of swirling vines.

Arranged in the glass were shards of cut glass made with maven-talent into a fairytale-like picture. Two figures stood, but only one was the center. A face, plain in the crudeness of the portrait but somehow intricately detailed in its own way, was young and solemn as the other, an elder wearing a robe red as the tapestry behind them, watched him with hands still held up where he had placed the golden crown upon the new king's head.

A sweep of shock went over Arthur as he recognized himself in the king's posture, and he read aloud to himself from twisted letters of his ancient language across the bottom panel,

"_Arthur Pendragon, King of Camelot_"

A foot of wall, and then there was the next window. A figure, but a small piece in the picture, unrecognizable to anyone who did not know the tale, stood upon a dark cliff, overlooking the scene shown below; again, the center of the picture was the king, who was poised with his hand on a great sword thrust into the ground beside the head of his opponent, a depiction of mercy toward the enemy. The hands of the figure on the cliff were raised, the scene with the king and foe encircled by rays of light.

"_Battle of the Wrath of Queen Annis_"

The next, the last on the wall—the new king on his knees with hands held up in pleading. Before him stood a man with dark skin surrounded by an aura of gray mist; he was bent with his hands upon the king's shoulders in tender forgiveness. Behind them was the same figure who had stood upon the cliff, but now, his bright blue eyes and red scarf were clear cuts of glass in the portrait.

"_Homage to the Druid Spirit_"

He raised his eyes and saw the window at the end, on the back wall directly across from where he had entered; it was the size of three of the other windows together, and rightly so. In this picture, the king in his armor held a gleaming sword high over a stone which was encircled by the same gold rays from the battle scene. The boy with the red scarf stood behind him once again, his eyes gold and his hand outstretched.

"_Excalibur_"

The word came from his lips with reverence, as his eyes took in the frame of multicolored glass, the beautiful colors and details around the edges, the trees situated in the scene. It stunned him to think that this had all been done for him—a memorial of his life. This was what had become of Merlin's grief, as the dragon had told him; remembrances of his life arranged with mourning magic in this imperial realm.

Arthur could not pull his eyes away from the glass figure of Merlin for a long moment. It was them in these images. Arthur Gregory and Colin James. It was incredible.

Then, he was abruptly brought back by the faintest echo of a door closing. The young man gripped the sword in his hand with intent and moved toward a doorway beside the window of Excalibur, determined to find his warlock.

* * *

Merlin pushed through the wooden door at the top end of the stairs; the handle had been locked against intruders, but it had known his presence even before he had touched it and it let him through willingly, just as he had designed it to do.

He ran through the room, past the artifacts lining the shelves which he had placed here; they were magical, and a lot of them dangerous in wrong hands—things he had gathered and stored here so that they would be protected. Perhaps he had fortuitously helped in clearing magic from most parts of the earth without realizing it.

It mattered little now; all that mattered was that he get Excalibur away from her. It was the most dangerous of all.

He ran up another flight of stairs until he was standing on a grass-laden rooftop. It was much like the fortress on the Isle of the Blessed, this place, but unlike the isle, the Avalon Haven was preserved. The stone walls on every corner would not deteriorate, the grass would never whither despite that there was no sunlight here, only a ceiling of starlight he had placed so that it would not be a frightening black all around the sanctuary. There was only one way it could ever be destroyed, and that was by a great power.

He looked up. Where he had exited, there was the huge, triangular doorway bearing a swirling symbol of the Old Religion above it to match the other seven doorways on each side of the octagonal rooftop. A great dome was the summit of the building, made of smaller stones arranged carefully and a large, empty circle in the very center so that one could stand in the main chamber of the sanctuary and see the night sky overhead—and, but once a year, the full moon grew powerful enough in the other realm so that it shone through here, and it moved in a perfect fit above the empty opening. That was truly a sight of splendor, to watch the moon light up this lonely building.

That night was tonight. It was when the magic of every realm was united. It was why Morgana was here.

Merlin did not once stumble as he ran around the roof, past four of the other enormous doorways to another set of stairs, these less decorative and more crude than the once within the haven.

Just when he was halfway up the stone steps, a great screeching like of an owl ripped through the ever-silent atmosphere of the realm, and he reacted instantly, turning with the hand not bearing Excalibur raised to throw a spell to stop him. Aithusa was already upon him, however, the white dragon's claws cutting across his shoulder and sending him reeling upon the sharp staircase. Excalibur fell from his hand as he cried out, but forcefully ignoring the pain in his arm, Merlin stopped it in mid-air with his magic and pulled it back toward himself.

Aithusa would not see it in his hands again, however, and his reptilian head reared back where he flapped in the air beside the roof; the sight of him would have been both beautiful and glorious were his eyes not flashing with red—the color of selfish and bitter magic. Fire, so hot it was blue, spilled past his razor teeth, and Merlin was forced to conjure an invisible shield with his good arm to avoid the agony of burning—not death for him, never death, but the pain of it and the time it would take his weakened magic to heal him would be damning to his fight.

In conjuring the shield, he was forced to press his back against the stone wall beside him and drop the sword in concentration; it fell down the staircase and landed at the bottom, the wrappings of Merlin's scarf dropping from it.

He heard Morgana—he felt her, more, as she stepped onto the dome above him from the main staircase. He felt it when she stood at the top of the stairs where he was pressed against the inside wall. He felt her smile as she saw Aithusa's dominance over him.

At all once, Merlin's eyes darkened. This was enough.

He could not have mercy for them any longer; what they had done—_what Morgana had let her hatred do_—to all of them back then, and now, it was _enough_. He had always believed that rage was a destructive force which could not be stopped once it was allowed to penetrate a person's heart, but now, he could not stop it from seeping into his mind. She had let Mordred kill Arthur, ordered her men to slaughter Gwaine, and Leon, Elyan, Percival, and even Lancelot in that battle; she herself had sent personal assassins to where Guinevere was hiding, safe by Arthur's command, in the citadel.

She had killed every friend he had loved; she had left him all alone in the world so abruptly, and she would do it again if she had the chance.

All at once, it was as though every feeling he had endured—every grief and strain he had suffered at her hand over their years in Camelot, and all those he had suffered after because of her, watching Arthur's lifeless body burn, stealing his bones away so that his mortal remains could be with Guinevere's, finding the good knights, one after another, lying in blood-soaked dust…It all rose in his chest, burning tears in his throat hotter than Aithusa's blue fire.

Merlin shouted—roared, hoarse and enraged. His shield disappeared—but it did not matter, because the force which erupted from his heart at his scream was enough to throw Aithusa back and halt his fire.

He felt everything. The cold air of his realm against his skin, his heart—with its one extra beat for his magic—thundering in his veins, Morgana's fear.

Morgana was afraid of what she saw in him, and he couldn't say he was sorry for that.

She started to come toward him, still hell-bent by her cruel selfishness to reach the sword which lay at the bottom of the staircase, but Merlin had reflexively thrown her to the side before she had taken the first three steps toward the stone stair.

Merlin took the steps upward so that they both stood upon the dome, and she stood up from where she had tumbled, her eyes equally as dark as his own.

She hurled a sphere of fire, more lightning-quick than a bullet from any manmade weapon in the human realm.

He caught it easily in his spread fingers.

At the same moment, Aithusa had recovered from his attack. Merlin could not see, but he knew that his magic was as angry as he was; it thrashed in him, ready to destroy them both just as it had the first time. Its singular emotions made it hypersensitive to their surroundings; it warned him with a pang to his chest when Aithusa's claws were bare seconds away from swiping up Excalibur below.

Merlin held his flat hand out toward the stairs and then curled his fingers. A reptilian scream erupted, and then Excalibur came at his call, its hilt settling in his palm. Aithusa, his wings flapping unsteadily now, collapsed on the edge of the rooftop, and there was a tear across the middle of his left wing from when the sword had slashed through it.

Merlin looked to the beast on his one side, then to Morgana on his other, bearing the sword in both hands.

"Enough, Morgana," he declared, his magic a low hiss in his voice. "Don't you see that this is enough?"

The witch's eyes flashed a red as blood-deep as her satin gown. In the same instant, Aithusa's eyes flashed the same.

Merlin held the sword tightly in his hands, the blade before his eyes as he looked from one side to the other as the two identical enchantments came at him from both immortal souls. His own eyes flashed golden as the letters of the sword.

The curses—though both powerful and harsh—were turned white by Excalibur's holy glow, but the enormous force of them was still absorbed into Merlin's fingers where they gripped the hilt, sending the combined magics shooting through his veins like a bolt of electricity through water. His eyes turned white for a half-second before he fell and dropped the sword.

His eyes were still fluttering as he struggled to maintain consciousness when Morgana's silhouette blocked the starlight from shining upon him.

"Not this time," she tutted, mocking him, and picked up Excalibur from the grass-coated stones.

Merlin scarcely had breath to move before the tip of the blade came down upon him, slicing through his stomach; Morgana continued to push it down until it sliced out his back and the tip of it met the stone beneath him.

Merlin's throat wanted to scream at the pain, but no sound would come forth as his nails scratched against the gray rocks and his spine was cut.

All at once, the air suddenly became charged with something which struck all three of them in their very spirits. Ribbons of pale magic began to circle through the air. The stars grew brighter.

Morgana pulled the blade from Merlin's body. The moon was close to appearing; mere moments, and the magic of all the realms would combine and be open for the taking.

* * *

The moonlight above and around him was unlike any Arthur had ever been beneath before; it seemed somehow living, thriving as it drifted down from the white moon overhead, which was so enormous in its proximity to him he felt as though he could jump up and touch it with his hand. For several heartbeats, his eyes were too confused to fathom where he was, and then he realized that he stood atop a great building made of ancient stone, for the blackness all around and the cool of the air was almost like standing upon a lonely mountain in the night.

He stood at the foot of a short, stone staircase, and so he took it; he could feel the magic within him spreading, leading him on as he took each step to the summit of the place.

When he reached the top, he felt as though he had reverted back to his old, great life, as though nothing in all the universe had ever changed, as though he still was a king and Camelot's fate still rested upon him.

Morgana, the true Morgana, the one whom he'd heard die by Merlin's hand, young and vicious as he ever recalled, stood in the center of the roof. Her gown was red and silken, her hair black as raven's wings, and her voice sounded devilish and eternal as she rehearsed words he still could not understand; they flowed like a river for her, however, and when she raised her hands toward the slowly-moving moon above, his heart recognized what she held.

It was his Excalibur.

As though in answer to her, the rays of the moon began to shift, the faint beams of light combining to attach themselves to the glorious weapon. A ripple of power went out as far as the edges of the rooftop, settling down over the whole place and changing it like a metamorphosis. Like water washing over the whole realm, it shifted around them to another place entirely, and then Arthur found that they were standing in the courtyard of the Isle of the Blessed.

He would remember the mystic place from his dreams always.

Arthur moved behind an old column overgrown with ivy so that she would not see him—not yet. He peered hastily around it, and then his heart froze cold with fear. Across the way, lying prone on the other end of the greenery, Colin lay unmoving upon the stone of the rooftop. Arthur would know the frail but mighty form anywhere.

His eyes narrowed, and his body felt more alive and his mind more aware than he ever had been in this lifetime. It felt like a dream—like one of his wonderful dreams.

Morgana let out a hoarse shout as she slammed the hilt of the sword down into the stone altar in the midst of the place. Though she was certainly not strong enough to do it herself, the stone crackled and broke into itself a crevice the perfect size to insert the sword so that the blade of it faced the sifting skies.

Arthur could hear his heart beating in his head, but this was nothing like it had been before, with pain and sickness and disturbance attached; this was something much more strengthening and heightening. He gripped his worn, meager sword in his hand and stepped around the column. He knew that Merlin could not die, but he was hurt; there was blood soaking the grass around where he lay, and so Arthur would do anything he must to reach him.

Aithusa roared, and Arthur was not surprised to see him in his true form, only now, there was some hurt in the black eyes, and he moved toward the king without balance. He dove out of the way of the twice-strong claws and caught a glimpse of his great, beautiful wing, torn and crippled afresh.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he felt oddly proud, as he always had, of his brave and tenacious warlock.

He tried to catch a glimpse of Colin, but the subsequent battle between him and the beast was blurring and wild, a clashing of steel against claws, his body diving to avoid the seething-hot flames the dragon hurled without mercy at him. He forced away all thoughts of Colin, Merlin, aside, and concentrated every muscle of his body to this fight.

Behind him, a strange sound, like electricity running along in a line of mystical, whispering music, had filled the air between the rooftop and the moon overhead, and he knew that this was that battle, the Final Battle, recreated in a new light so that it included none of the innocent warriors which had fought for each side. This battle included only them—him, Merlin, Morgana, the dragons—and it was now that they would see which of them would be the victors.

This was the beginning and the end all over again.

* * *

Merlin felt it when the realm opened. This place was so attached to him that it was always present in his subconscious, and though it never changed, he knew its state at all time. He knew the moment it altered and opened, peeling away to take them back to its equivalent in the real world, the Isle. For the last thousand and five hundred years, there had been no one here but him. Now, there were four, and crossed purposes.

His heart was thrumming with thrice its usual force. He had come close to death countless hundreds of times. He had been poisoned and brutally stabbed by enemies he had made throughout all the centuries in his work for good magic, and in later years, shot by guns and rained upon by bombs. Every time, he could feel his spirit—his life—moving within him, ready and wanting to leave, but then his magic, racing to heal his wounds and refresh his mortal body so that it would remain living and thriving with youth. He felt the pain of each attack, but it lasted only as long as it took his body to heal itself.

This time, it seemed to take an eternity for the deadly wound to knit together. His blood poured out of him, his limbs trembling as he struggled to push himself to stand with the wound still agonizing. His head was spinning, but the dull ring of his magic shooting through his veins was loud and soothing in his ears.

His eyes cleared from where they had become briefly black, as they always did when his body shut down for bare seconds before it awoke again, and the sight which met him would have shocked him even were he not still in such pain.

"Arthur." His voice was constricted and rough, but he did not even hear himself as he saw Arthur—_his Arthur_—near the edge of the courtyard, wielding a dulled sword with skill and veracity that would entrance the hardest of hearts.

There had been tales told and portraits drawn since even before Merlin's birth of brave warriors, gleaming in their armor, shining like gods for their gallantry and nobility as they warred with terrifying beasts which breathed fire hot as the sun. None of the pictures painted of these battles would ever compare to the sight of Arthur Pendragon, in his white button-down and blue jeans and Vans sneakers, bearing a sword that was fifty years old and fighting a dragon twenty times older with all the elegance and might of a king from the past, gallant and noble enough to be the leader of all those other warriors in history.

Merlin resolutely forced himself up, despite the agony swelling and still burning in his torso from the swiftly-healing wound, until he was on his hands and knees on the rough stone. The dragon was downed, but his body was still a weapon in itself, singeing fires and cutting claws; Arthur could only avert his blows for so long before the fight changed in the dragon's favor. Though the knowledge that he was _here_, that _Arthur_ was here, in this place Merlin had built from his grief at the king's death, was enough to spark a hundred unanswered questions in his mind, the warlock could only think clearly of one thing. He had to protect him.

He _would_ protect him.

He bit back a groan of pain as his injured body protested his movement, but he pushed himself up nonetheless.

* * *

Arthur lunged forward as Aithusa leaped back with reptilian grace, but was forced to roll skillfully out of the way as another spout of blue fire hissed at him. He managed to nick the leg of the beast just barely with the unsharpened blade, but his efforts only served to enrage Aithusa more, and he cried out as one of his claws cut a shallow slit in the right side of his chest through his white shirt (and perhaps it was an unmarked irony that it was the same white shirt he had worn on the day he had been shot and consequently saved by Merlin on the street in front of Camelot Bank, when they were just barely friends and his life just barely meaningful).

Morgana, from where she stood like a dark stone angel in the middle of the courtyard, cast a bare glance at them through green eyes. Her innermost instinct since recognizing her half-brother's presence had been to abandon her work and attack him, to finish both her enemies with one blow, but she refrained. Let him battle Aithusa, she decided; let him waste his time. It would not matter what either of them did to stop her, if she could complete this spell and gain the power of the fabled Excalibur.

Aithusa, at Arthur's slip of attention, took advantage. Another thudding strike to his lower back with the monster's heavy arm and he was forced to fall to his knees. A violent lashing against his shallowly bleeding chest and he was on his back.

With a strength he did not even know he possessed, Arthur gritted his teeth and held his hands (the sword having fallen aside) up to block the white dragon's pearl, razor-sharp teeth from coming down upon his throat. No matter what his mortal strength was, however, he could not throw a mighty dragon, and so they stayed locked in a struggle for several throbbing heartbeats, their eyes locked, black to blue. Then, he saw it in the back of the creature's throat; past the row of sharp teeth, blue fire was rising.

He forced all of his energy into turning Aithusa away, but it was no use. The fire would kill him. He had seconds left before he was to die again.

He turned his head to look for Merlin—the last person he saw the first time, who he would want to see lastly again.

He had not even recognized that the warlock was standing like an angry shadow steps away before a wave of red as deep as the satin of Morgana's gown had erupted from his outstretched hand and blown the white dragon aside as if he were made of paper.

Wasting not a moment, Arthur instinctively leapt to his feet again and grasped his old weapon up. Then, he found that he could hardly move even to breathe as his eyes locked to the intense blue-gray-green of his warlock's.

He tilted his head down, once, like an affectionate greeting and a mark of understanding all in the same motion.

At it, a grin, bright and boundless, spread across Merlin's shadowed face.

And as simply as that, they were together again.

Merlin, feeling whole and alive in a way he hadn't even thought possible, like he'd forgotten it in all his years alone, pulled his eyes away from Arthur's only to set his gaze upon the witch across the way.

"Morgana!"

When his voice, so deep and strong, echoed to her ears, the witch turned to face her oldest foe. She was barely in time to put a shield to block his attack of soft blue fire.

In the same instant, Aithusa, who had just recovered from the shock of Merlin's power, saw that his mistress was outnumbered by her assailants. He raised his elegant head up, and whilst he could not fly for his wounded wing, he looked like a hellish beast—beautiful in his sinful nature—rising up as he threw himself at Arthur.

Merlin was one half-second ahead of him, however; in the darkness of the courtyard, his eyes turned to two golden rings. Arthur, whose memories of their battles—their symbiosis, the way they came eventually to predict one another's movements and actions so that they could outmaneuver whatever they faced—held his hand out in expectancy. The old sword he had taken from Colin's apartment landed in his hand, and he swung it so that it sliced a new cut into Aithusa's cheek.

The dragon whined and swung at the man.

Merlin held his enchantment before Morgana so that she would be distracted from her own selfish spell, but as his eyes took in the scene behind her, and he saw how the great sphere of the red moon above had narrowed its rays and lifted Excalibur from the altar. The white-metal of the blade was beginning to gleam with the red of the sphere, as though the tip had been dipped in transparent blood and it was sliding down, coating it in its curse.

If it spilt into the golden letters and immersed them, it would erase the command from its gold forevermore. There would be no inhibition to its power, no command to its present bearer to be cast away and none to its new bearer to take it up again. The one who bore it then would do so for all of eternity; all she would have to do is ask it and it would reveal all its incantations to wield it to her. She would have its power; she would be limitless.

Merlin felt the burning of his eyes as he cast a stronger enchantment, this one of black fire—the hottest known to man.

Morgana gasped at the unexpectedness of it, but a spell of ice encircled it and stopped it mid-transport.

It was all Merlin needed, however—just a half-second when her black magic infused with Aithusa's was not protecting the place around the altar, where the red rays of the blood moon circled and blessed the object she had offered. His white magic cut through the red, striking the sword where it hung in the midst of the air and driving away the blessings of the moon.

Aithusa screeched at Morgana; the half-second of the dragon's distraction was all Arthur needed. A bead of sweat rolling down his face like a reminder of all the times he had battled before and come out the victor, he thrust the old and imbalanced sword into the chest of the beast. Despite all, there was still a small part of him which ached to harm a living creature so intelligent and beautiful, but he knew what this creature had done, and so he drove onward. The sword snapped apart when he twisted it, the upper end of the blade breaking off into Aithusa's chest.

The white dragon gave an earsplitting cry of pain, but a moment later, he came at Arthur once again with blazing red eyes and fire building in his throat.

Arthur's look of triumph faded to one of perplexity before it struck him. Dragons' hearts were on their right sides, not their left. He gritted his teeth at himself.

_Idiot._

With the broken-off sword, he lunged again, feeling the heat when the fire blazed just at the side of his arm.

Morgana, when her mighty spell of offering was halted so unexpectedly, grew slightly unsteady for a scant second, enough time for Merlin to throw her aside into a great column of the courtyard.

The old warlock ran agilely, struggling in his own mind to ignore the sounds of Arthur's battling behind his shoulder, and grasped up Excalibur where it had fallen limply on the altar. Already, half the ancient letters on either side had been wiped away; half its power was already loosed.

The glowing red rays of the moon moved around them like terrifying spotlights, but Merlin was not afraid of their glorious power which swirled in every one. Never before had he felt such magic in the atmosphere, singing in his head in the voices of a thousand powers—brothers of the power which dwelt inside him; his every fibre craved to relish in it, to hear what they had to teach him, but he could not concede to his desires. There was but one thing he could do now that would ensure nothing like this ever happening again, as long as the earth remained. It would demolish him forever, he knew, but to uphold his destiny he would need to sacrifice himself to it. He understood that now—perhaps he should have at the start.

So Merlin stood upon the altar, Excalibur held tightly in his hands.

Morgana, eye ablaze, threw every form of curse she could summon upon him, but it was no use now. The red gleams had focused upon him as he called out to them not with his physical voice, but with his voice of magic so that no matter how many realms from which they stretched forth, they would understand.

He made his request, and thrust the perfect sword, blade-down, into the stone altar, his eyes flashing gold. For a moment, his mind abruptly went back to a thousand and five hundred years before, when he had performed this same spell on an ordinary boulder in the Forest of Ascetir. Then, it had waited for its king to claim it. Now, it waited for its destruction.

It did not wait for very long.

Arthur felt a strange prickling under his skin; the shifting light in the place made him feel almost as though he were in a wild nightmare as he faced the razor-sharp teeth of the beast. His instinct remained alert and aware, though, despite the shivers running along his body, like ice and fire simultaneously rushed through his bones.

He stabbed the broken sword forward in one last lunge, and Aithusa fell with its hilt protruding from his heart.

Arthur never saw the moment the dragon's spirit left his living body forever, because he turned the very moment he saw he had the victory to see where Merlin was.

He saw Morgana upon the ground, her hand outstretched, her face contorted in inexpressible fury. He saw the blood moon overhead, the way its light seemed to have narrowed into a single, frightening beam. He saw the grass across the ground of the courtyard whipping in imperceptible wind.

He saw sparks like a white firework cascading down over the altar, where his warlock stood brave, looking like a terrible and indomitable creature as his eyes remained shining golden, rings of fire swirling. Excalibur glowed blindingly as the white glints encased it and the warlock both.

Arthur was driven to his hands and knees as a silent blast shook the ground and sent loosened rocks of the fortress tumbling all around him.

It lasted only a second, during which he could not get a breath forced into his lungs or feel any sensation in his body at all, as though he were held in time and space and scarcely even existing, and then it was over.

He raised his head. The chilling blood glow had dissipated into the night, Morgana and Aithusa had vanished either by force or by choice, he did not know, the moon over him shrunken and pale once more—or had it even been the moon at all? He did not know that either, nor did it matter, because when he stood to his feet he realized that there was nothing left but cold stone walls and silent air.

The altar where Merlin had been standing with Excalibur was barren and dark.

"Colin!"

His voice sounded eerie to his own ears, echoing against the edges of the place and continuing into the night. Unanswered.

He cupped his hands around his mouth, turning around in a circle as he moved toward the altar, his sharp eyes desperately searching for any sign of life in the shadows.

"_Colin_!"

It seemed to echo farther this second time, out across the waters of the lake to the shores where magic had once flourished.

A terrifying knowledge pushed itself into his consciousness of what Merlin had done, what sort of immense force it would take to destroy Excalibur—what that sort of force could do to a thriving soul, swallowing it up, absorbing it into its ageless thrum of power. It was magic made by the hands of the most powerful of creation gods. It would see Merlin's soul as a precious increase, a welcomed sacrifice to itself. It could consume his body and steal his spirit away with ease.

It could take his very existence so that he would be gone. That was it—simply gone, existing nowhere as nothing, forever.

A horror unlike anything Arthur had ever felt before, in either of his lives, washed over him and made his limbs feel cold and numb, his heart like it had been pierced through with a dagger. Was this how the gods had intended it to end—Merlin made from their power, sacrificed and returned to their power? Was his own purpose ended? Was this why he himself had drunk the potion of magic, so that at least he would have something to keep of him? Was he to continue on with his life as though he had never known the great warlock who had changed him so completely, never getting to know him again?

Somehow, he already knew the answer to these questions racing in his mind. It was over. Of course they would take Emrys back. He had never belonged to Arthur; he had been a power to use in this twisted tale. Perhaps they did not care if Arthur had come to love him. Emrys was not his to keep.

His hands shook, and the cry which tore from his throat was one which would grip the heart of the cruelest god, because it was the name he had not called in so very, very long that the magic still in his veins from the bottle stopped flowing for the vaguest moment in shock.

"_Merlin_!"

It had not finished reverberating about him before a movement—more the sensation of movement—made him spin around frantically.

Merlin's ocean-toned eyes were clouded with pure confusion and startlement like of one waking from a dream and not knowing where he was. He blinked rapidly where he stood, whole and alive, his short, dark hair falling over his forehead and his black shirt hanging too-big on his shoulders.

Arthur could not speak, too overcome by a relief and joy so strong it made his head swim after the rush of his adrenaline; he could only stare dumbly, his heart slowing in his chest, unable to comprehend for a long moment. It shouldn't be real—Merlin shouldn't be all right, not after that, but there he was, and he was fine. They were fine.

Merlin's eyes flickered up, clear and calm and bright, and the utterly stupid look on his face made Arthur want to laugh and cry all at once. He could make himself do neither, however, but only followed Colin's, Merlin's, gaze as the warlock looked down into his own fingers.

A familiar crown made of gold from the mines of Camelot, gleaming and unscathed, sat heavy with meaning in the warlock's upturned hands.

Merlin exhaled a shuddering breath, for this crown had disappeared from history he'd thought forever, and yet here it was, safe in his hands which had been clutching Excalibur in certain death only moments ago, the gold warm against his flesh. It was in that moment that he realized.

He had done it. He had fulfilled his destiny. He had protected his king. A thousand and five hundred years, and he had not failed. _He had won_.

Everything else forgotten, he looked up once more into the stunning dark sapphire of Arthur's eyes, and he could see it there, in his king's young and handsome face. He could see that Arthur understood as well, that he understood everything he'd been missing—them, their destiny, his ancient crown.

Arthur saw the glow suddenly alighting Merlin's face, the tears shimmering in the aged eyes, and he _did_ understand everything. He understood his past, the life he had been living, how empty and unimportant it had been before Colin James had entered it, and how difficult and disturbing it had felt after, when his soul was struggling against his mind and his spirit was compressed in the black magic he'd been suffering. He understood who he had been—a great king in a red cloak, bearing the emblem of a golden dragon, wisdom and strength. He understood the love he had known from his people, his knights, his wife, his warlock. He understood the man with whom he had parted after that dark battle, the sad and scared friend they had all left behind.

He understood the value of a crown of gold, and he understood how that it would never compare to the true gift the gods had granted him to have for himself.

So he took the crown from Merlin's hands and tossed it away so that it landed on its side in the damp grass, like a worthless trinket in the presence of a treasure.

Merlin's face fell to miscomprehension and some vague alarm at this. Couldn't Arthur see what this meant? This crown—this glorious crown—was a sign of his kingdom, of the worth of his life. It was the concrete knowledge of who Arthur was, how special he was to the gods and how significant he was to their creation. This crown was everything. It _meant _everything.

Then, for the first time in ten lifetimes, Arthur was embracing him all too tightly, crushing his spine and ribs equally as he held the warlock's shoulders firmly against his chest and exhaled softly against the side of his neck. He held onto Merlin as if_ he_ were the crown to be treasured, the relic which held the meaning of his life—the one thing that meant everything.

Merlin could not move for a long moment, and Arthur's arms were so strict around him that it was somewhat difficult to breathe. His eyes flickered over Arthur's shoulder to where the golden crown lay deliberately abandoned, but he could not even speak to tell him all that the crown was worth in his eyes. It took many more heartbeats of time before he truly realized what was happening.

Arthur knew him. At last, the great king was whole again. They were both complete.

After a thousand years of wandering alone, he was _complete_.

Merlin's tears had stopped flowing many centuries ago, when he had become numb to the incurable failing of the world around him. Now, he was numb again, but this time it was not for grief or despair but for the sake of peace and joy melding in his old heart, and he wondered if this moment was really lasting as long as it seemed to be, or if his mind was simply taking in every fraction of it like fresh water in a desert.

"I'm sorry." Arthur's voice—Arthur's _real _voice, strong and sure and legendary, murmured in his ear, and Merlin could not fathom for what he could be apologizing, but it did not even matter now. "I'm sorry, Merlin."

This ignited a stuttering exhale from him, and as if his body had awoken, Merlin's arms clutched around Arthur in answer. He was warm and solid, and the feel of him made tears spring into the warlock's eyes.

"I missed you." It was all he could think to say; a thousand years in the world had passed since he'd watched the man die, and this was the only thing he could think to tell him. It was the only thing he _needed_ to tell him.

But that wasn't all, he reminded himself as a wave of old guilt washed over him. There was more he needed to say, which Arthur deserved to hear even though it would hurt him to have to tell him so soon after getting him back by a miracle.

He pushed away, though he did not want to do so, because he knew he must look into his king's eyes when he said it; it was the only way he could face what he had done.

Arthur regarded him with a worried frown, and the young man—_But was he really so young anymore, now that he remembered his many years of life from before?_—never released Merlin's arms, keeping his hands locked around them so that both men could be assured of the other.

"I'm sorry, Arthur," Merlin said, and he wanted this admission to portray his acceptance of whatever just anger he would receive, but instead it sounded only sorrowed and regretful, heavy with unshed tears hundreds of years in the making. "I betrayed you. I broke my word; I failed you."

"What are you talking about?" the other man asked honestly, uncomprehending of why Merlin would have any reason to look any guilty in this moment, after what he had just done to save them all. Still a fresh memory from his dream formed in his mind, of a promise sworn in the last few minutes of his life from his greatest friend.

Merlin's eyes were shining with a great regret which Arthur wanted nothing more than to wipe away. There was a fear building deep within his chest, however, for he did not understand what Merlin could have done that would warrant such regret_. "Promise me that you won't be like them."_ How could Merlin stand here before him, willing to give up his very soul to stop them, and say that he was guilty of their sins?

"I wanted to die, Arthur," he said, and his tone, though soaked in tears, did not sound as though he were asking for pity or comfort, but as though he were humbly confessing terrible misdeeds which haunted him, "before I knew you were alive again, they came to me and demanded my help. I gave them what they wanted. I broke my promise, after I swore I'd never lie to you again. It was the one thing you asked of me and I failed you. Forgive me, sire."

Merlin looked as though he would have dropped to his knees before him were Arthur not gripping his upper arms so tightly.

The king suddenly found himself fraught with an anger which had nothing to do with a broken promise. No one of less character and goodness than Merlin could ever have held it in honor for so very long; no one less could have stood firm in his vow to remain good, throughout all this time of darkness and loneliness in a dying world. Arthur would never have expected it even of himself, yet here Merlin was, having lived through gods only knew what and pleading for forgiveness for the one thing he'd ever done to be unfaithful to him, as though _anything_ could make Arthur believe he was unfaithful, as though it were a terrible crime for him to be so exhausted and alone that he wished for death.

The very thought of Merlin breaking under such a burden and seeking relief from the likes of Morgana was enough to make Arthur inexplicably enraged that he had ever reached that low.

"Merlin," he said, and some of that protective rage must have seeped into his voice, because Merlin only looked ever-more ashamed and refused to raise his eyes.

"Merlin, look at me." He shook him this time, gently, but Merlin only shut his eyes as though in dread of what Arthur might say, and so he released one of his shoulders and pressed his fingertips to his precious friend's face.

Merlin, at the unexpected touch, conceded and looked to him with that burden of guilt evident in his eyes.

"It's all right," Arthur said once their eyes were locked again, wishing that he could find more eloquent words to assure his friend of his feelings, but he spoke all that he could in hopes that it would make Merlin see. His Merlin. He smiled. "Do you hear me, Merlin? Everything is all right now."

A single tear dropped from the warlock's eye, and he smiled in consoled harmony with the king's words, for the first time in so long truly believing them.

Arthur, seeing that old, familiar grin ghosting over Merlin's face, added with intent,

"You can make amends with a new promise, Merlin. Promise me that you'll never again try to die, no matter what happens. Swear to me, Merlin."

Merlin swallowed and never broke his gaze.

"I swear."

The words had scantly escaped his lips before Merlin was embracing him fervently, and this time, it was Arthur who could hardly breathe.

Merlin felt the man's chuckle tickle his dark hair as Arthur placed a hand to the back of his neck; then, Arthur was pushing gently away from him.

Merlin gave him a shaky smile when the man's dark blue eyes studied the warlock's face for a moment; Arthur must have seen something special in his offered half-grin, because he returned it full-fledged with sparkle in his gaze. Smirking, he patted Merlin's disheveled hair down on one side, just like Merlin had done for him so many times after a championship tournament or before a meeting when he had been in too much of a hurry to brush his hair, in either of his lifetimes.

"Are you hurt badly?" was the next thing said, as Arthur looked down and realized that Merlin's shoulder was bleeding sluggishly.

"No," answered the old warlock, and he held up his hands to see that they were indeed trembling, but not with hurt, "considering I'm supposed to be nonexistent."

Arthur's fingers relaxed, and the little huff of mirth which escaped him had Merlin grinning madly like he hadn't done since he was a younger man. The warlock caught sight of a streak of wet red staining the white of Arthur's shirt, and, knowing that he would not be unwelcome, he pressed his palm flat over the shallow gash.

Arthur watched which a soft and grateful expression as Merlin's eyes changed to gold and the vague sting of his little wound flitted away with his mended skin.

"Any other injuries?" It was Merlin who was looking keenly into his eyes now, searching for any signs of pain.

"No," he answered honestly, at the same time thinking in his mind how utterly incredible it was that all of this—Merlin, magic—was real.

Merlin exhaled with relief, and then his eyes took on a strange light which Arthur did not comprehend until the man pressed his flat palm against the center of Arthur's chest as though listening quietly for a long moment. Then, his gaze flickered back up to Arthur's face and he was smiling tenderly at something.

"My magic," he said simply. "You have it."

Arthur recalled suddenly the bottle he had discovered in Colin's flat, and he could feel his face coloring the slightest bit; he was unsure what Merlin might think of his having taken it.

"Kilgharrah told me it was the only way to find you," said he in explanation. "Is that…?"

He trailed off as Merlin's eyes widened while he spoke.

"Kilgharrah?" he repeated in a hushed voice.

"Yes," he answered, as he realized suddenly that perhaps Merlin had not yet met the Great Dragon; to see the new light of happiness spread over his countenance at the knowledge that their old friend was indeed living again fascinated Arthur warmly.

Merlin said nothing more, but the smile which seemed to have brightened the dark atmosphere around them was free and unhindered as the waters of the lake around the isle where they stood. It was that same grin he had seen so many countless times in their old life, but never once in this new one; Colin James had grinned just echoes of it, never truly the whole and real thing.

To see it in his fullest capacity again jolted something in Arthur's memory, and he dug into his pocket under Merlin's curious gaze and retrieved the ring which he had placed there after he had awoken from his dream and found himself clutching it in his palm.

Merlin's expression softened as Arthur put the ring into his hands.

"This is yours," said the king to his warlock, and though neither of them voiced it, but comprehended the depth behind the gesture.

Merlin folded his fingers around it; he vowed inside his heart never to let it be taken away again, and he was not entirely certain if he meant the ring itself, or its giver.

Suddenly, something in the sky to the east caught Arthur's sights. Merlin followed his gaze to the first few rays of sunlight dispelling the darkness. It was the most beautiful sunrise he had ever seen in all his hundreds of years, rays of orange and red and yellow stretching out like painted strokes across the canvas of the sky to drive away the black night. Such sunrises never occurred in Albion anymore. It was like a sign from the gods that a new era had truly begun.

"Let's go home," said Arthur.

As they began to walk together, past the forgotten crown lying in the grass, Merlin spoke with eyes filled with childlike excitement and his voice, so low and agedly wise, rising in volume. His words spilled out as he gripped Arthur's forearm without even considering it.

"I have so much to tell you, Arthur," he said energetically, like he was a bright-eyed boy with a thousand years' worth of things to say; then again, perhaps that exactly what he was. "I can't wait to explain everything. So much has happened; you have no idea—"

His words echoed in a jumble of noise off the walls of the isle, and Arthur cut him off mid-sentence.

"Merlin!" he laughed, and he wanted to keep laughing, because Colin, Merlin, was so very familiar that he almost could not believe it. After so many hundreds and hundreds of years of ageing and learning and gaining power, Merlin _had_ changed—but then, not really.

The warlock seemed to realize suddenly that he was babbling, and he laughed aloud as well at himself.

When they were gone, their laughter continued to echo in the corridors of the place, and the dead vines which had long-since wrapped themselves around the columns and across the walls stretched up to greet the sunlight with green leaves for the first time in a thousand and five hundred years.

* * *

**To be continued  
(In Epilogue)**

* * *

(1) Phonetic Greek: "Come to me!"

* * *

_Yeah, so TOTAL change of pace in this chapter, I know. I read back over it and I'm hoping it wasn't too insane for you readers to follow, since it was almost too insane for me to follow and I'm the one who wrote it. (I honestly don't know what's wrong with me sometimes.) Only one more chapter to go, and then it's over. I'm actually sad.  
Hey, has anyone else heard that the release date for Season 5 came out? If not, let me be the first to tell you. I read that the producers confirmed it premiers September 29! Just a month longer! (Is it wrong of me to hope that Jesus doesn't come back before then? xD)  
Songs for this part:  
All In by Lifehouse  
Open Up Your Eyes by Jeremy Camp  
There's A Place For Us by E.M.D.  
You Raise Me Up by Celtic Woman (yes, I proudly admit that I love Celtic music :P)  
I'm saving all the finale songs for the next chapter, but I thought these really fit here. And HOLYZARQWAN there's this song that I heard that doesn't necessarily apply to my story, but I instantly thought of the show when I heard it. There's one part in it that is incredibly perfect (or maybe I'm just a little obsessed); either way, it goes: "One of us is big and brave [Arthur], one of us is tender-hearted [Gwen], one of us is tempting fate [Morgana], and the last but not least of us has faith enough for each of us [Merlin]." It's called I Will Believe by Nichole Nordeman; find it, listen to it. It'll blow your mind.  
Thanks a hundred thousand times over for reading this far! You have no idea how much it means to me, when I'm out and bored and suddenly I get a new e-mail with one of your wonderfully positive reviews; please be honest and let me know how you liked this last big part, and I'll post the epilogue Friday—I promise.  
And, as always, words I want you all to remember:  
__"There's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it."  
And…__  
__"You're always better than you give yourself credit for. Remember that."  
Fairfarren, all._


	8. Epilogue

_I was really trying to keep this epilogue from exceeding 5,000 words. It's 5,032 words. Oh, well. It works if you round it to the nearest thousand, I guess.  
I'm in a sad mood, because this is, indeed, the final part of TVITD. I have had so much fun writing this fic, and reading all the wonderful reviews from all you amazing people! Thank you so, so much for all the nice things you've said! I really appreciate it; it's really helped me be encouraged to write my own book. Speaking of which, I thought it was only fair to warn you that I might not be posting quite as much, because I really feel like I need to focus on my book and if I try to write serious fanfiction AND the book, I'll get distracted by the awesomeness that is Merlin (especially since Season 5 is less than a month away, now). So I'll still write for Merlin, just maybe not as much. Then again, maybe it'll be more than ever, once I get inspired by Season 5. Who knows. LOL  
I thought I'd give you that slightly sad news (sad for me, at least) before my happy ending epilogue, so we can all get cheered up! :D  
And I have to tell you: I have Spotify on my laptop, and I accidentally stumbled across the Merlin theme song yesterday; I actually said out loud (to Merlin, presumably) before I even realized it, "Awh! I miss you, kid!" I thought I'd let you that you're not the only one who might be a little obsessed with this show. ;)  
And now, I present the end of this story:_

* * *

**The Voice in the Dream  
Epilogue**

When Merlin awoke, he did not move for a great while. He merely lay where he was in the dreary afternoon light, curled up in his most comfortable leather chair from France, watching his friend sleep on the Persian sofa beside him and listening to the perfect silence of his flat with a peace he hadn't felt in centuries.

Tomorrow, he would have to invent an excuse to explain why Arthur had not been available for the past three days to run his father's businesses. There would be a mountain of paperwork for himself and a list of responsibilities to compose for Arthur. There would be months of successes and mistakes before they would both understand how to function in this new life of theirs. Tomorrow, they would pick up where they had been before Morgana had nearly destroyed them; they would return to that life of luxury and laughter which they'd been living for months...only this time, they were not just Arthur Gregory and Colin James any longer. Now, they would have all of the greatness of those lives, plus so much more. The thought of it was one which made him sigh with pure happiness in the quiet of the room.

He had no idea if Morgana had survived. The power he had felt when he'd plunged Excalibur into the magic from which it had come was one too enormous and complex for even him to understand; he could not say what sort of havoc or order it had set into motion. If she had survived it, she would surely not abandon her cause. She would return with more unbridled fury and a renewed taste for revenge upon the king and the warlock who she believed had thwarted her life so many times over.

Perhaps it was a mad thought, but Merlin was actually almost hopeful that she was still here. To have a task to fulfill, a worthy man to protect and guide, an evil to overcome…what he once thought were burdens now felt like the best of blessings after he'd lived an existence of emptiness and monotony for so very long. Now, those days seemed so far behind him that he almost wondered if they had even occurred at all; the past in between the time when Arthur Pendragon had left him and before Arthur Gregory had stumbled into his life seemed like nothing but a dim blur, and the present and future seemed so bright by comparison.

He found his hands were trembling with that thought. Though his magic was yet weak from the cut he had made in it to save Arthur, he felt stronger in spirit than he'd ever been before. He was ready for anything that might happen now.

He had no idea how long it had been since he'd merely sat there, quieting thinking, but finally Merlin felt the faint soreness in his muscles and decided he would go and dress for the day; a hot bath would do him good, he knew. It was time to get up. It was time to be the bold and determined warlock he needed to be, for Arthur, for his destiny—for the love of Camelot.

He smiled in fond memory of that slightly ironic phrase as he stood and pulled the woolen blanket from the back of his chair to drop over the still-slumbering Arthur. They had both been so exhausted in the early morning upon return from the Isle of the Blessed that neither of them had even thought to turn on the heat of the flat before they had both collapsed in sleep in his living room. The high, cold breeze from the window shattered by Kilgharrah had chilled the whole room once the noontime sun had vanished around the building.

As he half-stumbled over the items he still hadn't picked up from where his magic had turned the place into a cyclone, he rubbed at his eyes and straightened the ring on the new chain around his throat where it had slid awry while he'd slept. He hardly dared to think how disarrayed he looked, and so he scantly looked into the Grecian, mosaic wall mirror in his bedroom as he passed it, except in his peripheral vision through his still-blurred eyes.

A second later, he froze in the doorway of the bathroom, suddenly feeling entirely awake and alert and trying to keep his hopes from rising in his chest as he turned back to stand before the mirror.

He put his hands against his jaw to reassure himself that he was not imagining it…but no, he could _fee_l it too.

He released a breath he hadn't even realized he'd been holding and prayed to the gods that he wasn't hallucinating from exhaustion or magic deficit.

* * *

Arthur was abruptly wrenched from his most comfortable, dream-free sleep in months by a sound which had him alert in barely a second's time.

"Arthur! Come here!_ Sire!_"

Not wasting a moment, he leapt up from the sofa and followed the desperate sound of Merlin's voice into the bedroom across the flat. When he burst into the room, he half-expected there to be a terrible crisis—Morgana returned, the white dragon attacking, something which he and Merlin would have to overcome together—and he was surprised to find his friend alone in the little place with his eyes glittering with tears and his young face broken into a stunning grin.

"What?" he asked breathlessly, eyes darting around for any sign of danger, hand reaching out to yank Merlin behind him if need be. "Merlin, what is it?"

Arthur was even more startled when his friend grabbed his wrist in a vice-grip without a word of explanation. His eyes tightened in confusion, but he did not jerk his hand away from where Merlin had pressed it firmly so that his palm cupped the angular jaw and his calloused fingers half-tangled in dark hair. His perplexity mounted when the warlock pressed both his hands atop Arthur's to ensure that the man would keep it there.

"Ah…Merlin, what are you doing?"

The old warlock seemed to be unable to answer for a moment, smiling through two tears which fell from his bright eyes, and Arthur wasn't sure whether he should be concerned that his friend had finally lost his mind or pleased to see him look so happy.

"My hair," Merlin stammered out finally, half-choking. "Arthur, my hair is growing!"

Arthur flexed his hand. Surely enough, he could feel the coarseness of short stubble, and now that he was looking, he could see it peppered lightly across the other man's alabaster skin in the early afternoon light coming from the window.

He didn't even get the chance to utter a hope-laced inquiry before Merlin was speaking again, tears flowing freely and soaking Arthur's fingers.

"My hair hasn't grown since the day you were crowned king," he said, his voice shaking audibly even as he grinned. "Arthur, I'm ageing!"

Arthur scarcely had time to register this statement for what it meant before Merlin was abruptly in his arms, half-embracing him and half-collapsing against him.

"Whoa, easy, Merlin," he chuckled against his raven hair, easing them both to the floor when he realized the other man's legs had buckled under him.

The young king could feel warm tears which hadn't been shed the night before soaking his shirt, but he hardly cared as he once might have. He had yet to know anything of what Merlin had experienced in his immortal life, but he did know—at least of the majority he could recall—that this endless existence had purely terrified his dear friend when they had spoken of it in the stone halls of their castle.

The soft sobs shaking Merlin's narrow body and the way he clung to Arthur were evidence enough to him that all his years had not changed that. Arthur could only imagine what dread he had been experiencing all his long life, if he ever considered having to say goodbye a second time after he'd found Arthur so many months ago—_had it really only been months?_

They would never say goodbye again, he realized, not really, and he found himself looking with soft eyes around the room where they were now, past all the strange and colorful relics scattered about the warlock's bedroom and out the window where London was bustling in the evening traffic.

So much had changed in his time away; the lives and very mentalities of the people of the world had altered more than he perhaps realized. Yet, here they were, two men—brothers—of that past world who had found each other again, proof that that time of magic and hope was not entirely forgotten, after all. It would live on in them until the day they died, a part of them bigger than anything anyone could take away. They could look to each other and see it.

Arthur tightened his arms around Merlin's back and shoulders, closing his eyes and just letting his friend babble uncontrollably into his ear.

"All this time," the warlock whispered through wet coughing around his tears, "all these years, I've been all alone, never knowing what…when..." He trailed off as another controlled sob wracked him. "I'm free. I can hardly believe it. I'm…I'm finally _free_."

Arthur smiled against his hair.

"It's all right, Merlin," he said, for once knowing that he was saying exactly the right thing. "It's all right."

Merlin pressed his face into the king's broad shoulder, his head and heart in turmoil, scarcely able to believe that finally, _gods, finally_, he was free of the terrible curse. He would finally see what lay beyond this life. He would finally know what it was like to pass over, to breathe his last breath in this world and take his first in another. He would finally see his mother, his father, Gaius, _everyone_ he remembered so often. Finally, he would not be alone, ever again.

It was more than that, though. It was so much more. It meant that all the strife from the day he'd arrived it Camelot had at last ended in victory. One thousand and five hundred years of history, and he and Arthur—all of that which had formed their legend, the good and evil and pain and joy and _everything_—it was culminated in this one moment, this staggering moment when it all fell to pieces at his feet and suddenly it was like even the evil and pain were memories of victory. He was everything Kilgharrah had told that naive farmboy that he would be. He was even more.

His magic surged warmly over his entire body and then fresh, hot tears blurred his eyes once more. His magic...his magic had _known_. His magic had always known who he was, who he was going to become before it was all over. His magic knew that this moment was their future. It had just been waiting for him to realize it for himself.

He could not stop another sob, and he felt Arthur pull him ever-closer, and hear his voice—Arthur's voice, the voice of his other half, the other side of his victory—murmuring gentle reassurances in his ear. They were all right, he said, and Merlin believed him. He believed him with all his heart.

When Merlin only barely managed to compose himself enough to push away from Arthur, he looked to see that the young king was smiling through tears just as prominent as Merlin's own. He understood too. Of course he did.

"Arthur," he said in whispered joy, putting his hand on the side of the man's blonde hair like a loving parent touching a child whom he'd thought lost, "I can die now."

Arthur chuckled again, sniffing and trying to stop his crying even though he didn't really care that much anymore, and he never objected to Merlin's touching him, though he once might have, as he answered back in his old, loud, laughing tone,

"Well, not yet, if you don't mind."

Merlin nearly choked on his laughter, and he leant forward and embraced Arthur again with his hand still against the side of his face.

Arthur smiled and sniffed and let him and vowed he would never again object to an embrace from Merlin. No matter how he thought it was awkward or annoying, he would always remember how Merlin's face had looked that night they had said goodbye, and he would just let him.

At long last, Merlin pulled away from him again, but the flawless grin had not faded even though his eyes had dried. Arthur grinned back and couldn't resist saying, with as much obnoxiousness as he could muster at the moment (which ended up being not very much at all and more unadulterated gladness than anything),

"I think you're getting soft in your old age, _Mer_lin."

"Oh, yeah?" Merlin answered back, lightning-quick, even as he wiped moisture from beneath his eye. "And what's your excuse, _boy_?"

Arthur burst out laughing, and kept on smiling as he and Merlin stood to their feet and the warlock looked into the mirror once more, babbling in that very Merlin way (because there was just no other way to describe his babbling, even now) about how he might grow a _real_ beard this time, or at least let his hair grow out like Orlando Bloom's in that movie about the pirates and how did he even know who that was because he didn't watch movies and he rather liked Orlando Bloom's Legolas-hair better anyway and _why_ was he even talking about this because he's a bloody warlock and he feels silly now.

Arthur listened to him go on and on, and laughed aloud when his prattling got ridiculous; all the time, so many questions—dozens upon dozens—were forming in his brain, about everything, everything he'd been missing, everything he'd never voiced to Merlin in their past lives. He was ready to know now, ready to sit and listen to his friend talk for hours on end about anything the warlock wanted. He owed him that. He owed him everything.

All of that—his questions, all the things he wanted to know about Merlin—could wait, however. For now, the both of them were simply content to go about the flat, cleaning things up which Merlin's magic had thrown and talking about absolutely nothing and everything.

Mid-way through a peculiar discussion about the similarities between Merlin the Legend and Gandalf and why Merlin insisted he personally had a part in inspiring Tolkien to write the books, there was a quiet knock from the front door of the flat.

All in an instant, Merlin and Arthur, like their instincts were connected, tensed and met the other's eyes, the same thought upon both of their minds. So far, the people who had showed up unexpectedly at either of their flats in the past six months were extremely and entirely unwanted guests. The odds of it being an ordinary person after the night they'd had were really rather pitifully slim.

And so it was for this very reason that Merlin silenced himself immediately and tossed another sword from his world-gathered collection toward Arthur as they both maneuvered stealthily toward the door.

A quick glance to Merlin, and Arthur swung it open.

Immediately, he was smitten mute.

Merlin, who had seen and done the most shocking and extraordinary things all across the expanse of a millennium, could only blink wide eyes.

For a long moment, no one spoke; they were three people suspended in breathless silence, and then the young woman standing in his doorway said, timid and fumbling, as though she wanted to say something else but couldn't get the words out,

"Is this Colin James's flat, the assistant to Arthur Gregory? I tried his flat upstairs, I think, but there was no one…"

She trailed off after that, her tender, caramel gaze focusing on Arthur, who had yet to move or even blink.

"You are Arthur, aren't you? I mean, I wanted to meet you and introduce myself to you—both of you—because…well, you see, I'm…not quite sure how to say this, but…first, may I come in?"

It was at that time that Merlin suddenly came to terms with the fact that he was probably most capable of adequately dealing with this situation, and he cut his eyes to Arthur for a moment before he spoke the simple words which were heavy with meaning.

"Yes, he's Arthur—"

Gwen pulled her eyes away from the handsome blonde man to look at his mystic-faced companion, knowing already that she had them both more than memorized.

"—and I'm Merlin," he finished, and he could see it in her eyes that she knew exactly what he meant.

Guinevere's hand came to her mouth, and she giggled breathlessly.

"Really?" she whispered, hardly daring to believe it.

"Really," Arthur's deep and assertive voice cut in, and he hadn't yet released the Arabian sword in his hand, but that was all right; Guinevere wasn't the slightest bit afraid.

She lowered her hand from her face and looked into his gorgeous blue eyes.

"I'm Guinevere," she said, "but most people call me Gwen. In fact, only one person doesn't; at least, he didn't…long ago."

It was almost a question, and one to which Arthur more than had the answer.

"Would you like to come in, Guinevere?"

She most absolutely, positively did.

Arthur tossed the old sword aside and brushed his hand against her long, soft hair as he pulled out a chair for her at the table.

Merlin pushed aside a few bottles of glowing potions in the refrigerator to fetch some of the biscuits he and Arthur had made from scratch two nights before and some grape jam, because Queen Guinevere had always loved grape jam.

Gwen smiled at them both, took their hands when Arthur sat beside her and Merlin across, and talked about strange dreams.

* * *

Guinevere McGrath had a brother named Elyan. He'd left home after his parents accused him of being an attention-seeking addict because he swore his and his sister's dreams were connected somehow. Elyan dreamt of being held hostage by a wicked sorceress with blonde curls and a hawk-eyed king, rescued by his brave sister and a noble prince, and later attending their wedding in a throne room as a knight in a great kingdom called Camelot.

Merlin found him a week after Guinevere met them, and Elyan never subjected himself to the escape of drugs again.

* * *

It was two months after this, at a train station on a business trip with Arthur in Venezuela, that Merlin met Lancelot Cabrera, who also had strange dreams about a little sorcerer who helped him defeat a griffon and a tear in the veil between two worlds and a wonderful life in a kingdom called Camelot.

* * *

A month after that, and a mostly drunk bloke who called himself the Green Knight (because he rode a green motorcycle) defended Gwen against a gang of entirely drunk blokes in a crowded pub off Baker Street. Gwaine Macken had dreams about being banned from a great kingdom called Camelot by a king called Uther, about being returned as a knight by Uther's fair-minded son called Arthur, and about taverns all across five kingdoms.

* * *

Three weeks later, Arthur shook hands with the kind-eyed son of one of his father's esteemed Welsh business companions. The son's name was Leon Young, and his strange dreams consisted of the desire to be a knight of a great kingdom called Camelot since he'd been a child, a chance to do just that when a spirited prince called Arthur accepted him as a trusted friend, and a fulfilling life fighting beside King Arthur and other noble knights even until the final battle.

* * *

After that, it was only a week before Merlin, Arthur, Guinevere, Elyan, Lancelot, Gwaine, and Leon were on their way to have a long, explanation-filled picnic in the country and stopped to help put out a fire accidentally started in a small apartment building in the little town. Two minutes they were there, and then a local, off-duty fireman emerged from the billowing smoke with an armful of coughing children.

His name was Percival Hopper, nicknamed "Gentle Giant Percy" by the admiring townsfolk, and he dreamt of befriending a young traveler who spoke of a great kingdom called Camelot and a kind young manservant who lived there, of helping that traveler, the manservant, and their future king take back the city from a vengeful witch, and saving the lives of hundreds of innocent children as a knight in the land.

* * *

On that very afternoon, all eight of them watched as the sun set over the hill across from the one upon which they had set up their picnic, their long conversation—filled with shocks and laughter and solemn memories—having at last died away some minutes before.

Arthur kept his arm around Guinevere's shoulders as the sun started to go down, and it was almost strange to him to see the valley so often in his dreams and memories empty of the city he had once so loved. He could remember it so clearly, however—the way the sunlight glinted off the high towers and the smoke rose in dissipating trails toward the sky. He would hold onto that vision for all of time, and cherish it in his heart more than any of his companions could even know.

As the men grew bored (as young men are wont to do), Gwaine shoved Leon so that the rich young heir went tumbling to the ground. Arthur rolled his eyes fondly as Leon retaliated by kicking the shaggy-headed man's knee, which sent him half-falling atop Percy. It was barely moments later that all five of them left Arthur, Gwen, and Merlin sitting on the blanket as they chased each other some little distance away, playfully practicing their reawakening combat skills against one another.

Arthur watched the sun sink a little lower, simply remembering, until Guinevere nudged him gently and gestured with a tender smile toward Merlin.

The warlock, who had happily let his wavy hair grow out past his ears so that it was close to covering his eyes, was lying on his stomach with his head in his arms near Arthur's knee. The king (for he would always be that) leant over the slightest bit and peered down into his friend's face, confirming to his fiancée that the man's eyes were indeed closed, faintly flickering under his lids as the noise of the men's laughter echoed to their ears.

Arthur, partly curious to see if his warlock was sleeping and partly getting annoyed with the length of the locks of dark hair which he refused to cut, ruffled a few of the wavy strands out of Merlin's face.

Merlin's eyes opened, slightly blearily with the exhaustion of trying to explain to five young, bright-faced men all the details of their strange and wonderful dreams, and he smirked softly at Arthur without bothering to move even his head.

As Arthur chuckled at him and turned to press a kiss to the curly hair his lovely bride-to-be, who rested her head against his shoulder in return, Merlin kept his eyes on them for a long moment, making sure that the two of them, watching the sunset, was the last picture he saw before he closed his eyes again and gave into the call of sleep.

He had strange dreams too, filled with colors and faces and voices from past and present melding together to form one reality in his mind. He never really spoke of his dreams, but he held onto them, and to the people who were their center. He would never let go again.

* * *

In the end, the peace was well and good for a few more months, but of course there was still the problem of Arthur being the Once and Future King and Merlin being the Greatest Warlock Ever. Such meant that destiny would not keep away from them but for so long, and their destiny never failed to bring danger along with it.

What they hadn't known—none of them, not even Kilgharrah, who visited every once in a while—was that the return of the King of Albion had reawakened something deep within the earth's core. Magic lived again, as it had before, and it was not very long before it spread to the surface and revealed itself to the skeptical world, not in any sort of burst of power, but little by little.

Merlin told Arthur one evening a year after the man's spirit had reawakened that he'd felt the magic pervading the city and seen strange news stories appearing in the papers which grasped his attention, and that he had the feeling magic would someday return. Arthur had considered this in his own heart, until finally, five months later, strange incidents began to appear all across Britain, much more than Merlin had seen in many centuries. Kilgharrah told them gravely that magic might never be as prominent as it once was, but that it was the responsibility of all who knew of it to keep it safe and balanced.

On the first night of October the following year, Merlin and Arthur sat in Gemma's Café eating a warm meal Gwen had made just for them (for while she was now the wife of one of the richest and most powerful men in Britain, she vowed she would always help care for her aunt's little shop). As they talked about nothing in general, Merlin suddenly froze where he sat.

"What's wrong, Col?" Arthur asked, his spoon half-way to his mouth. (Though Colin James was no longer a façade between them, Arthur Pendragon's great magician Merlin and Arthur Gregory's best friend Colin had blended into one in his mind, and so he called him whatever he felt like, and of course Merlin didn't mind in the least what Arthur called him).

The warlock was quiet for another short minute, and then he shook his head dismissively, though his eyes were still tight, the blue of them looking even brighter against the dark of the locks which framed his pale face now.

"Nothing," said he. "I just thought I felt something, that's all."

"Something like what?" his friend pressed, putting down his spoon into his avocado soup.

Merlin's brow furrowed and he held his breath, taking in the feeling again.

"A weird…vibe," he answered finally, and then he glanced upward toward his right, as though he were looking through the ceiling. "I think there's someone practicing black magic in the building next door, Arthur."

Arthur, though he had not seen with his own eyes any magical activity in a year (apart from Merlin's, of course), chewed on his lower lip for a moment before asking,

"So…should we do something about it?"

Merlin cut his eyes toward him and smirked.

"'Like old times,' you mean?" he joked. "I thought you wanted to be at peace now, sir."

"I never said that," Arthur replied, slipping the cell phone he'd laid upon the table back into his pocket. "The truth is, Merlin—"

His warlock tilted his head in interest as the king's tone became suddenly low and hushed, weighty with quiet sincerity.

"—you always said that it was my fate to keep my kingdom safe. I've been thinking a lot about it lately, and…even though we've presumably completed our destiny, my responsibilities to Albion have not changed, have they?_ I still feel as though I have a duty to the people of this land. Do you think I'm supposed to have that feeling, Merlin, and that I'm supposed to use it?_"

The older man's smile broadened because, though Arthur hadn't even noticed (as he never did), his language had changed half the way through his solemn admission to the language of their first lives. Arthur was King. No matter what name he had or what era he knew, he would always be that.

"Come on, then," the old warlock, who somehow didn't feel so old after this year, replied simply, and Arthur followed him, and he always followed him, out of the restaurant with a quick wave to Gwen that they would be returning.

Arthur and Merlin soon discovered that it was Morgana who was teaching black magic to people who were vulnerable to its possession. She had survived, after all, and now she gathered together followers in the darkest and dirtiest parts of Albion for her revenge. Those whom magic had gifted upon its return to the surface, she sought out. It was a game, a dangerous game, Merlin and Arthur and their friends against Morgana and Aithusa and their dark powers, but the more innocent souls of magic Merlin found and salvaged before she could reach them, the safer Albion remained.

Merlin did age, and when he finally died an old man, surrounded by open, star-dusted skies, he entered with serenity into the next world.

In the short time which separated them, the king heard his warlock's voice in his dreams, and he knew that very soon, he would see him again.

**THE END**

* * *

_I really do hope this ending is satisfactory! Let me know in a review, and I just want to thank everyone who as reviewed so far, and who will in the future.  
Here is the final song list for this fic; enjoy!  
All In by Lifehouse  
Our Lives by The Calling  
This is Home by Switchfoot  
The Voice by Celtic Woman (I know it might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I think it works with the whole atmosphere of the show in general, not just for my fic.)  
Remembering You by Steven Curtis Chapman  
Open Up Your Eyes by Jeremy Camp (This one is actually more for the previous chapters and not so much for this one, just so you know. ;))  
First Time by Lifehouse  
And that concludes it! PLEASE remember that you are free to request any fic you want me to write; just let me know if you'd like to see any part of this fic expanded upon (such as something in the beginning of Part iv or in the last part of this Epilogue). I'll be happy to write it if it's requested. :D And also feel free to take any of your ideas about this fic and write them yourself. I would love nothing more than to find someone wrote a story set in this 'verse; just send me a link so I can read it! :)  
I am so excited that everyone who's read has seemed to like it so much. Please, please, please pray for me and wish me luck on my original book. I really need it. haha  
And lastly, my sign-off:  
__"There's magic in you; you've just got to reach past everything else to touch it."  
And…__  
__"You're always better than you give yourself credit for. Remember that."  
Fare thee well, everybody!_


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